The Torchwood Philosophy
by Arlath's Star
Summary: The Team's thoughts on issues as wide-ranging as free will, homosexuality, miracles, adultery, the soul, lying, conscience, life after death, God and the meaning of life, the universe and everything. Originally my philosophy revision, now just random.
1. A Rose By Any Other Name

**I won't lie. I'm writing this primarily because it counts (sort of) as revision for my religious studies course, and I find a bit of 'alternative revision' useful every once in a while. I mean, I want to write, so I may as well write whist revising, yeah? **

**Don't be put off. My course contains subjects as diverse as free will, homosexuality, the meaning of language, ethics, the environment, miracles, adultery, the soul, lying, conscience, marriage, life after death and God - so I'm sure you'll agree that it has a lot of story potential! Especially when given that Torchwood twist…**

**And a big thank you to gernumblies for starting me off…**

A Rose By Any Other Name…

Ianto gazed in despair at the row of tiny, but oh-so-important, objects in front of him, the key to the whole problem, unsure what to do. There had to be a way out of this dilemma somehow; there must be some combination… He could almost see it out of the corner of his eye: that master stroke he so desperately needed. But the pieces just wouldn't fit together…

Leaning over his shoulder Tosh reached her hand out and quickly shifted some of the plastic tiles around. Flashing him a quick grin, she left again.

"Hey!" Jack protested, as Ianto spelt out 'zephyr' on the scrabble board. "Asking Tosh for help is cheating!" 

Ianto smirked in a self-satisfied way. "I believe I get triple points on that 'z', sir. And a double word score."

Jack put on a mock scowl as he wrote down Ianto's score. "You're not going to win you know, Mr Jones." He grinned down at Ianto as he put the score-sheet back down, on which Ianto was now in the lead by a fair number of points. "Soon you will cower before my great plan – a move so ingenious that not even Toshiko could think it up!"

"Evil genius doesn't suit you well, Jack!" Gwen called over from her workstation.

Jack grinned back and dropped the 'evil mastermind' accent. "Watch this." Reaching out carefully he placed his own tiles on the board whilst Ianto held his breath. These were the last tiles in the game – if Jack scored high enough on this one, Ianto would lose. And thinking back on the bet they had made, he really, really did not want to lose.

Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click.

Ianto looked down, paused, then looked back up again. "That's not a word Jack."

"Yes it is."

Ianto looked down again. Q.U.J.Z.E.K.Y.X. "No, Jack, it's really not. You've just made it up to use up all the last letters. Look, you can't even pronounce it."

"Of course you can pronounce it. You can pronounce anything. You're Welsh."

Now it was Gwen's turn to look over Ianto's shoulder. "Qudgezekhics?" She asked, intrigued. "What's that?"

"Qudjze_kix_." Jack said firmly. "Go on, say it: Qudjze_kix_."

They duly repeated him, then Gwen asked; "But what does it mean?"

"It doesn't mean anything." Ianto was adamant.

"Yes it does. It's a type of drink – sorta alcoholic."

Ianto sighed. "From where, Jack?"

"Er… Poosh."

"Poosh." Ianto repeated, his voice perfectly steady. "And that would be the planet Poosh, would it?"

"Yeah. Lovely place. I've visited several times. Great tourist hotspot."

"And is the name of its famous alcoholic drink in the Oxford English Dictionary?"

"Probably not." Jack confessed.

"Then it doesn't count."

"It's still a word, Ianto."

"It's a foreign language! You're not allowed foreign languages in scrabble!"

"You put down café earlier."

"Yeah, well, that's anglicised, Jack!"

"You and Gwen both used my word, didn't you? Doesn't that make it anglicised? Or Welshified."

"'Welshified' isn't a word either."

"But you know what it means."

"So?"

"So it must be a word."

"No, because it doesn't _mean_ anything."

"Here." Jack pointed to one of the words on the scrabble board: 'Lagoon' "Does that mean anything? Really?"

Ianto frowned. "It's a geographical feature. A small, inland, warm, freshwater lake, I think."

"But the word isn't the feature. The word's just a few lines on a page; a few sounds in the air. It doesn't mean anything in itself."

"But it does because we _give_ it meaning."

"In that case qujzekyx is a word, because it means something to me." Jack grinned, thinking he'd trapped Ianto.

"It's in a different word game." Tosh commented. She explained further as the rest of the team gave her blank looks. "That's what they're called: word games. Groups of words that get used in particular places. Vocabularies. Like the way 'hub' and 'rift' and 'weevil' have different meanings for us than they do for…"

"For people who aren't cave-dwelling freaks." Owen completed, joining in the conversation for the first time.

"Which means that it doesn't mean anything!" Ianto proclaimed triumphantly.

Jack grinned. "Neither does what you're saying. It's just an opinion. It doesn't mean anything concrete."

Gwen frowned. "But that means that what you just said… that's meaningless too then, right?"

Owen smirked. "Caught in your own trap, Harkness!"

Jack turned on him. "So how would you tell if language means anything?"

"Er…dunno." Owen thought for a second. "I suppose I'd see if what they were saying was actually true. Test it scientifically, or something."

Gwen buried her head in her hands. "But that doesn't work for opinions either! And they must mean something – I mean, they mean something to the person who has them! This whole arguments silly!"

"And potentially meaningless." Ianto added softly.

Jack returned to the original question. "So what about my word then? Is it acceptable?"

"No." said Ianto shortly. "Not by the rules of scrabble. I told you that at the start."

"You just don't want to let me win." Jack teased him. "Remembering what out little deal was?"

Tosh, Gwen and Owen looked between the pair of them curiously, but no further explanation seemed to be forthcoming. Sorting through the muddle in her head, Tosh tried to sum up the argument: "So, Ianto, you're trying to say that most language is meaningful and Jack's word isn't, so it doesn't count; and Jack's trying to say that all language is equally meaningless so his word is just as acceptable as any other."

"But it still doesn't fit the rules."

"Since when did I ever fit the rules, Ianto?"

"But we're having a conversation together! Our words must mean something."

"Not necessarily."

"Then what if I say this…" Ianto leant forward and whispered something in Jack's ear, the others leaning in closer to try and overhear. "…Does that mean anything to you?"

"Not exactly the same thing it means to you." But Jack was still grinning slightly.

Owen sighed irritably. "Why can't you just decide who's won and save all the flirting for later?"

Jack grinned even wider. "Why don't you decide, Owen? You and the girls? Does my word count or not?"

Ianto looked up, anxiety written all over his face.

"No." said Tosh firmly. "Sorry Jack."

"I think it does." Owen returned, despite having no real opinion on the matter. There was an evil glint in his eye - he desperately wanted to see what bet this was that Ianto was so worried about.

"Gwen?"

"Sorry?" Gwen stopped gazing thoughtfully at the scrabble board and looked up.

"Does my word count or not?"

"Oh, yes, I think it does. Why not? " Gwen continued defensively, ignoring Ianto's quiet groan. "It's a really nice word. Even if no-one can pronounce it."

Jack's grin almost split his face in half as he drew a thick black line underneath his final score. "Beaten by twenty points." He looked across at the slumping Ianto, his eyes gleaming.

"Do the words 'personal slave for the next twelve hours' mean anything to you, Ianto Jones?"

**My current exam plan is to write one of these and really, really hope the examiner likes Torchwood. And that the story won't get that muddled again – I think they ended up changing the argument several times so that I could get more philosophers in. I apologise for this, but it was necessary. **

**Coincidentally, the last-but-one time I played scrabble we only allowed Torchwood-related words, which rather limits you a bit (though we did manage to get 'Ianto' in twice). And then the nest time I played scrabble the first word I came up with, purely by chance, was 'reset'… **


	2. Winning Tickets in the Lottery of Life

**Wow1 I wasn't expecting so many reviewers! This is my **_**revision**_**, for crying out loud! I'm sorry so many of you were confused – it's the most confusing topic of the lot and I really shouldn't have started with it. So thanks to NikkieSheepie, milady dragon, deeta, gernumblies, Ravenja70, the darkness revealed, specialfrancine, Marygirl, Marian Locksley, L.A.H.H., thedeejay and gurugirl. **

**Apologies in advance in case I offend anyone during this chapter (up to and including God). Most of it is not my opinions. And it's on miracles, so you know. **

Winning Tickets in the Lottery of Life

It was a typical Torchwood evening.

Jack, Owen and Gwen were racing on foot through the gloomy back-alleys of Cardiff, rain bouncing off their heads and a weevil just ahead of them. A scared, angry, hungry weevil, which was running very fast in the opposite direction.

"Tosh!" Jack gasped into his comms as they skidded to a halt at a crossroads, having lost their target. "Co-ordinates!"

"_400m to your left, Jack, round the side of the building. I've got it up on the CCTV – there's a civilian too. Hurry!"_

And they were off again, sprinting through puddles, guns already out.

"_I've got a predicted Rift spike too, same area, in just a few seconds!" _

Any other time, Owen would have made a sarcastic comment about how good things come in threes (counting Torchwood as the third thing, of course), but right now he was having enough trouble breathing.

They rounded the corner just in time to hear someone scream out what sounded like a prayer and catch sight of the weevil towering up, ready to lunge, too late for a bullet to stop, when there was a flicker of light and a resounding crash.

When Owen and Gwen later found themselves trying to explain what the noise had sounded like to a disbelieving Ianto they found it almost impossible. The closest they could get to it was 'like someone dropping a really heavy, badly tuned, grand piano from fifty metres up in the air onto solid concrete'.

Because that was exactly what it was.

Ignoring the other two's confused oaths of shock mingled with the sound of tortured piano strings, Jack rushed forward. He could see the weevil's foot sticking out from underneath the wreckage, and a very surprised, ancient-looking, white-haired woman backed up against the wall, speaking very fast in a language of which the only word Jack understood was 'miracle'.

***

Three hours later, Gwen had returned the ecstatic Italian tourist to her hotel (the old lady was convinced that she had been saved by an act of God, so they hadn't thought it necessary to retcon her) and Jack and Owen had finished clearing up the mess. Now they were all back at the Hub, telling the story to Tosh and Ianto.

"And she thought she'd been saved by God." Owen ended, grinning at the memory.

"Maybe she was." Tosh suggested.

Owen laughed at that. "She was saved by the Rift, Tosh. You even predicted it. It's just ironic that the thing that nearly killed her in the first place saved her."

"And what controls the Rift then? How do you know that isn't controlled by God?"

"That would say a lot about God then." Ianto murmured under his breath.

Gwen picked up where Tosh had left off. "It's not the weirdest thing that's happened and been called a miracle, anyway. Look at all that stuff in the Bible – great floods and demons and people rising from the dead and all sorts."

"Yeah Gwen, and we've seen most of that happen and none of it was miracles. It's either the Rift or Jack being weird." Owen grinned slyly at his boss.

Gwen stood in front of him and challenged him, annoyed that, as normal, he was refusing to listen to anyone else's point of view. "How do you know it's not a miracle?"

"Because… because it's not breaking scientific rules. The laws of the universe, or whatever you call them."

There was a short silence.

"I believe," Ianto said slowly "that a dead man – someone who is _literally_ a dead man walking – is trying to argue that he has never seen a law of nature broken. Not even the one about 'people don't come back to life'. Am I right?"

"Yeah, well, it's not the same, is it? We've got a scientific reason for that… well, a kind of scientific reason…"

"To be fair, it's not a very good scientific rule anyway." Tosh smiled. "I know at least two people who've broken that particular one. It's not really a rule, it more of a…"

"A guideline." Jack beamed happily. He had once been forced to watch the Pirates of the Caribbean series by an amused team, who had long ago regretted ever making that particular name connection.

"Anyway, rules of nature or not, a piano falling through the Rift and crushing a weevil could still have been caused by God." Gwen pointed out, returning to the original argument. "And she did pray for help. Maybe her prayer was granted."

"Why couldn't God just have given the weevil a heart-attack?" Owen asked incredulously.

"And why would just one person be saved?" Ianto asked. "Just one person saved from a weevil attack, versus all the hundreds who have died thanks to the Rift before. And all the other ways people suffer in this world – why can't God help them as well? Send some miracle cure for every disease through the Rift, or something, if that's how you're saying it works. Just picking a few people here and there isn't fair."

Owen brightened up, seeming to like this idea. "So if miracles exist, God is mean, yeah?"

"But if everything was a miracle…" Tosh mused. "If God caused _everything_… then He wouldn't be biased."

"But He'd still be a bastard."

"Owen! You're not supposed to say that!"

"Why not? What else is He meant to do to me? I'm already bloody dead, Gwen! If God controls everything in this universe then He's having a right bloody laugh with me!"

Jack placed a restraining hand on Owen's shoulder. "I'm the one who does the controlling around here, Owen. You're alive because I wouldn't let you die. A man who can't die saving a man who can't live - how's that for a miracle, eh?"

"I think it's a miracle." Gwen said softly. "Everything in this weird world is if you look at it in the right way. What were the chances of everything happening so that we got the world exactly like it is today?"

Owen was about to open his mouth to retort, but Jack stepped in first. "Miracle or coincidence – I'd like to see any of you prove it either way! It's down to your beliefs, and just that. If that lady thought that piano was a miracle then it is a miracle for her – even though we know it was a coincidence. Things can be both."

"What about you then, Jack?" Ianto brushed a strand of hair out of his eyes, still unable to make up his own mind. "Do you believe in miracles?"

Jack looked round the Hub – his Hub – his mind flicking through all the things he had seen, all the places he had visited, all the people he had met and all the things he had done to end up here; all the countless coincidences that had had to happen… And then he carefully studied the faces of the four people in front of him. His team. His perfect team.

"Yeah." He said. "I do. Sometimes."

**Well, I hope I've got your minds working again! What do you think? **

**The title is based on a quote from a book called 'The Solitaire Mystery' by Jostein Gaarder. It basically says what Gwen says – how big a coincidence is it that we're alive today, given the chances against it? And the title from the last chapter was from Shakespeare's 'Romeo and Juliet', saying that a word is just a name we give a thing. It's one of my favourite quotes from the play because Rose is my middle name, and also because my English teacher often had problems remembering my first name. Along with most of the rest of my teachers. **

**And, as a slightly less philosophical question, does all the Owen/Gwen stuff in series one technically count as adultery? And even if it doesn't should I write a chapter on it anyway? **


	3. Runaway Cars

**Thank you to my reviewers! That's: gernumblies, NikkieSheepie, gurugirl, milady dragon, Ravenja70, specialfrancine, L.A.H.H. and Marian Locksley!**

**Sorry this took so long – I have been at all sorts of concerts and proms, and haven't had much time for my 'revision'. Plus, I wasn't exactly sure how to write this one, so I've been putting it off. **

**This time the title is from a quote by Richard Holloway – 'Human Sexuality is like a runaway car.' It's one of my favourite quotes that I have found for the topic so far, and aside from 'Thou shalt not commit adultery', one of the most memorable. **

**And the first bit's from Gwen's point of view, before anyone starts thinking that I'm cheating on my (non-existent) boyfriend. And it's meant to be two-sided. **

Runaway Cars

_I shouldn't be doing this. _

_But it's good. It can't stop. _

_Every morning I wake up and tell myself to stop. Every time I walk into work. Every time Owen grins at me, or Rhys asks what I did at work. How am I meant to go on with this? _

_That's a lie Gwen, and you know it. Every time Owen grins at you you stop thinking all together. That's why this is good. Someone who understands, someone who knows what you're going through… _

_What am I doing to Rhys? Lying to him, always lying to him, every single time. How can I keep on doing this to him? He'd never lie to me, never. He's a good man; good and kind and patient and…_

_And boring. Admit it, Gwen, Owen's right. And you're already lying to Rhys – how can a few more lies do any harm? _

_Because if he finds out it will wreck our relationship. And I need him and his stability, just like Jack said._

_But I need Owen too. And being with him's just amazing…_

_Stop it! Just stop it! _

"Gwen!"

"Jack?"

"You're brooding. Sitting at your desk, staring into space, not noticing that everyone else's gone home… What's up with you, Gwen Cooper?"

"I'm fine."

"No auto-pilot. You need to talk."

"I'm fine."

"Uh huh. So why are you still here then? Afraid to go home? Afraid to face Rhys? Or can't you decide whose door to go to?"

Gwen blushed fiercely, turning away. "Who told you that?! Did Tosh…?"

"Tosh told me nothing." Jack leant in over Gwen's shoulder, and smiled at her. "I haven't lived this long without learning to recognise when two of my friends have got together."

"Oh Jack! What am I meant to do? I can't do this!"

Jack interrupted her. "First, I'm going to get you a cup of tea and some biscuits, if I can find where Ianto's put the stash. And then you're going to sit down and talk this through properly."

He turned away and headed towards the kitchen, noting Gwen walk reluctantly up to his office. He'd been meaning to talk to her about this for a while now. That was the problem with people like Gwen: that sense of morality was just what Torchwood needed them for, but give them a moral dilemma of their own and they'd tear themselves apart from the inside; conscience, desire and reason all battling it out. And this time he wasn't going to let his team's personal problems go unnoticed and unsolved long enough for them to become a danger to them all. He'd learnt that much from Ianto, at least.

He placed the plate of biscuits and the mug of steaming tea in front of her slumped figure and sat back in the chair opposite, waiting for her to start.

"How much do you know?"

Jack thought for a moment. "Enough, I guess. That you and Owen have had this going since our little field trip, and that Rhys doesn't know."

"No, he doesn't." Gwen replied quietly. Jack watched her patiently as she played with the biscuit in her hand before finally speaking again. "I shouldn't be doing this."

"Why not?"

Gwen looked up at Jack for the first time. "Because it's hurting Rhys. And I love Rhys – I don't want to hurt him! I need him, Jack - I don't think I could cope if he left!" Gwen swallowed and stopped.

"And what about Owen?" Jack prompted after a while.

"He's, he's… he knows about this." Gwen waved her hand around the Hub without looking up from her knees "He understands what it's like, what I have to do each day – I think I'd go insane otherwise!" Gwen took a deep breath. "But it's wrong!"

"Why?"

"It's adultery, Jack! Adultery's always wrong; everyone says so! It's even one of the Ten Commandments! God, if my parents knew what I was doing…"

"It's not adultery. You're not married."

"But we've been together for years, and he trusts me, Jack. It's a serious relationship. We're supposed to be honest and faithful and committed… and everything I'm not! And I keep telling myself I've got to stop and that it can't go on any longer and I promise myself it won't, but then I think about Owen and I start all over again! It's like a drug – I just can't stop. What should I do Jack? What should I do?"

"I can't make that decision for you, Gwen. I've got different morals – different morals from a different era."

"So what do your morals say?" Gwen whispered.

Jack closed his eyes. "Do what brings the most good to the most people – what you think is right. And don't let your relationship with Rhys slide – you're right that you need him, and that I need you for that."

"And what about Owen? What if I need him?"

"Whatever you think's right, Gwen."

"How does that help! I don't know what's right – no, I do, but I can't do it! If Rhys finds out… But it's good for Owen, and it's –" Gwen swallowed again "- good for me and I need it…"

_And I haven't even told her what this is doing to Tosh._ Jack thought to himself as he watched her gaze despairingly at him, tears beginning to run down her cheeks. _But I can't burden her with that as well. And I'm not helping her at all. _"Do what you need to do. It'll be the right thing." He moved across to try and comfort her, but Gwen stood up, wiping her eyes on the back of her sleeve.

"Where are you going?"

Gwen turned around to face him again, her bag already on her shoulder, and gave him the one clear decision she'd arrived at that night.

"I'm going to go and get pissed."

**I'm not sure that I actually wrote Jack correctly there, so some comments on that front would be useful. As for the Gwen/Owen thing, I think it was what they both needed at the time, but that it was good that they stopped when they did. It quite clearly would not have worked long-term. I'm less sure about the way Gwen retcons Rhys, but for both I can see myself in her position and doing something very similar. But then I've been known to beg forgiveness for misdeeds I committed when I was 7, despite the fact that they weren't really that important and that almost everyone has forgotten them, so Gwen's need to gain forgiveness too makes perfect sense to me. **


	4. Still A Good Sign By Any Standard

**Whoohoo! Thank you to my fabulous reviewers: NikkieSheepie, gurugirl, milady dragon, gernumblies, specialfrancine, thedeejay, L.A.H.H., MadCatta and Marian Locksley! **

**And here we have for you – religious experience! And this time the quote is from Monty Python's 'The Life of Brian'. And I know this is chapter four, but I forgot to mention earlier that I don't own Torchwood. Or Monty Python. Or any of these philosophical theories. Or pretty much anything else. **

Still a Good Sign by Any Standard

Tosh pondered the screen in front of her – the information on it was telling her one of the strangest things she had ever heard. Ok, so the Rift _was_ unpredictable – it wouldn't be the space-time split they all knew and loved if it wasn't – and even last week's piano wasn't too much of a shock when you sat down and thought it through properly, but this…

"Jack?"

"Toshiko Sato? What have you got for me today?"

"You know that Rift alert which you and Ianto investigated last night? When you couldn't find anything that had come through?"

"Uh huh."

"Well look." Tosh drew her chair back so that Jack could take a proper look at the screen.

Jack read the article, blinked, and read it again.

"What is it?" Gwen called out as she wandered over, wondering what had got Jack so intrigued.

Jack summarised it for the rest of the team's benefit. "Apparently there were mass reports of weird experiences round the Cardiff Bay area last night."

"'Weird experiences'?" Ianto echoed, a questioning tone to his voice.

"Visions, strange voices, odd dreams… that sort of thing."

"What kind of odd dreams?" Owen asked, looking up from the scalpel he was toying with.

Tosh answered this time: "They've got quite a few people claiming that they saw the Virgin Mary, or heard God's voice speaking to them. And some Hindus who saw Shiva. Plus there are reports of people who've been converted by it, and a reformed burglar as well." She smiled brightly. "I suppose that's alright then."

Owen frowned and turned back to tossing his scalpel. Gwen studied him thoughtfully. "Your flat overlooks the Bay, doesn't it? Did you experience anything like that last night?"

"Yeah." Owen said, then realised they all wanted more explanation than that. "I had a dream and lo! – an angel came down from heaven and spake unto me and said 'Owen Harper, thou hast had too much to drink again. This pleaseth the Lord not, for thou hast sinned in his eyes.'" Owen looked up at them all. "Happy?"

"Seriously?" Gwen asked, her eyebrows raised to match Ianto's.

"Well, skip a few 'thees' and 'thous' and you get the general gist of it." Owen sniffed. "So, did any of you receive personalised divine messages?"

They all shook their heads, Jack adding; "Sounds like you're favoured, O Owen."

Owen snorted in reply. "I'd just had too much to drink, alright? Don't knock it."

"So you're saying that everyone in the Bay area got drunk last night?" Tosh asked disparagingly.

"Maybe it was something in the air." Ianto suggested. "Hallucinogens, or something, that came through the Rift."

"Hang on." Gwen said slowly. "Weren't you at the Hub last night, Jack? Surely that would be in radius?"

Jack shrugged. "Nothing. Maybe we're too deep underground. And that would fit with the air-borne drugs explanation. Or it could be your boyfriend's explanation." He winked at Gwen.

Gwen frowned for a while, then realised what he meant. "Oh! The psychotropic drugs in the water supply thing! When you first told me there were aliens! I'd forgotten that!"

Ianto tilted his head to one side and mouthed '_retcon?'_ at Jack. Jack nodded quietly in return. He really needed to write himself a memo reminding him to investigate how Gwen managed that. Or alternatively he could give her the memo and retcon her again and see whether or not she remembered… Jack looked up as he realised Tosh had just asked him a question.

"What I said was – there might have been a physiological cause like you just mentioned or it could have been real."

"You mean they all experienced God?" Owen asked sceptically. "En masse? Look Tosh, it was just some kind of delusion or something, and people interpreted it religiously because they'd been brought up that way."

"So you were brought up religious, were you?" Gwen had pounced on that almost as soon as he said it, but the others ignored her.

"How would you tell if it was real anyway?" Ianto asked.

"I think real religious experiences are meant to have certain characteristics, though not always the same set." Jack explained. "How about we do a tick list with you, St Owen?"

Owen just glared in reply, so Jack continued. "Right. It's got to be passive, which is true because Owen didn't cause it or want it, and neither did any of those other people. It's got to impart knowledge of God you wouldn't otherwise have – in this case that God doesn't like Owen's booze-ups."

"I thought he could have guessed that from the hang-overs." Ianto quipped.

"…It's got to be indescribable..."

Tosh frowned. "But Owen could describe it."

Owen shrugged. "Not properly. There was this weird feeling too, like, like… oh I dunno."

"Indescribable." Jack repeated. "And the effects are long-lasting. You considering giving up drink, holy Owen?"

"No."

"Well, three out of four isn't bad."

"It doesn't prove it's from God though. It could have had all of those and it could have told me to murder you all – would it still be from God then?"

Ianto looked thoughtful. "I guess you'd only say it was from God if it told you to do something that agrees with his rules. Murdering us all probably doesn't do that."

"Alright then." Owen challenged them all. "So how come some other guy saw Krishna, or whatever? Surely the fact that we saw different things shows it wasn't divine?"

"Well, if they're indescribable, everyone will translate it in different ways using what they know already." Gwen pointed out. "So if you're a Hindu you won't see Mary. There!"

"You still can't prove it! Even if I became a bloody teetotaller you couldn't prove it!"

"But it's still possible." Tosh said reasonably. "After all, there are a lot of people out there right now claiming that God did speak to them. That's a lot of evidence."

"And you'd just believe them, would you?"

"You can't go around assuming that everyone is lying to you all the time. It wouldn't work." Ianto replied.

"Unless you're talking to Gwen Cooper."

"Owen!"

"Well, obviously you'd get rid of known liars." Ianto rejigged his argument a little.

"Ianto!"

"Gwen!" Owen mimicked, but Jack stepped between them.

"Owen, stop teasing her before you get smited. As for the rest of you, we've got work to do. I want drinking water samples and air quality samples and whatever other samples you can think of. Until we've done that I don't want any more arguments about whether or not this was real. Understood?"

Owen raised a hand. "It's the Sabbath. Since I'm now holy, I shouldn't have to work."

"It's Saturday, Owen."

The doctor didn't even blink. "I've converted to Judaism."


	5. Saints Are Like Television

**Many thanks to ALL my reviewers! L.A.H.H., NikkieSheepie, milady dragon, specialfrancine, Marian Locksley and gernumblies. Sorry I didn't haven't had time lately to reply properly to anyone – you deserve it! Have some imaginary cookies instead. **

**More on miracles, because I was reinspired by 'Millions' (It's a good book. Read it.) That's where I got the title from, on the basis that it's vaguely relevant. This continues straight from the last chapter, though I expect you've read that if you've got this far. And to make matters clear, Owen is NOT now Jewish. He was joking. **

Saints Are Like Television

Report on Saints

By Owen Harper

Yeah, yeah, I know – never complain that you've got nothing to do in front of Jack. Especially when everyone's still joking about you being a saint. So I got saddled with this. Though it's more interesting that I expected.

There was actually a Saint Owen, back in the 7th century. He was French Bishop, helped the poor and homeless, preached a lot, blah blah blah. Your typical saint, really.

I couldn't find a St Ianto, and I didn't even bother typing in Toshiko. And St Jack's not up there either, though the list of St Johns goes up to at least 21. But there was definitely a St Gwen. She was back in the 5th century, and she's a lot more interesting. For a start she had three breasts, and she was martyred (this basically translates as 'murdered by Saxon pagans'). And apparently she's invoked for women's fertility.

I tried to find us all some patron saints after that. Personally, I reckon the Torchwood saint should be Saint Jude – the saint of lost causes. Or we could have Jack. He's been martyred more than once, if you translate that as dying horribly for what you believe in.

My favourite doctor's saint is St Pantaleon, 'cos he was nailed to a tree and beheaded. Just shows what you get for trying to help people. I bet it was the patients that did it. And as for saints and drink; well St Pyr (yeah, yeah, he _was _Welsh.) drowned after falling down a well, having been in a drunken brawl. He seems to have been saintified by mistake. If I ever do the same in Cardiff Bay will you lot put that I died a heroic death down on the files?

Tosh, I found you a computer saint – Isidore of Seville. He does technology as well. You can pray to him next time I knock your computer cable out.

Jack - I couldn't find you much apart from St Christopher (travellers) and Saint Ramon (secrets). But loads of people claim St Christopher's just a myth. I suppose that's another parallel.

There are patron saints of both police officers (Saint Sebastian, who coincidentally got tied to a tree and shot full of arrows, survived, and then got beaten to death. It's a fun life being a saint. Course, it could have been the police bit.) and social workers (St John Regis). But I think Gwen should take her example from Simon Stylites, who lived on top of a 15m tall pillar for 37 years so that he wouldn't have to talk to anyone. (Extreme measures?) I'm not sure we could manage a pillar but we could probably fix up the lift somehow.

As for Ianto, there are patron saints of archivists (St Jerome) and cleaning (St Zita), but the best fit is definitely St Drogo. There are three major similarities:

1. He was reportedly able to _bilocate_ – i.e. he could be in two places at once. Sound familiar, anyone?

2. He's the patron saint of **_coffee_**

And…

3. He's also the patron saint of 'those whom others find unspeakably repulsive'

Instant messenger conversation

GWEN: See! I told you there were loads of reports of miracles!

OWEN: Living on top of a pole for 37 years isn't a miracle, it's lunacy.

GWEN: Yeah, but translocation must be one

OWEN: No it's not. Ianto does it for a start. People just notice that someone keeps appearing suddenly and the story gets exaggerated until people call it a miracle.

IANTO: Hullo.

OWEN: Speak of the devil

GWEN: Or the saint :)

IANTO: What's this about 'those whom others find unspeakably repulsive'?

OWEN: Nothing. Ignore it mate

GWEN: Can you bilocate, Ianto?

IANTO: Nope. Don't think so.

OWEN: No one can. Not without alien tech, and the saints didn't have that

GWEN: how do you know? There's all those Welsh saints – something could have fallen through the Rift.

OWEN: Yeah, and all the others? Forget it, Gwen. It's all just gossip and illusions. What's more probable: that a miracle actually happened or that someone got it wrong?

IANTO: What if lots of people saw it? Like the feeding of the five thousand. That's quite a lot of people getting it wrong.

OWEN: You've heard the alternative explanation for that, haven't you? Everyone had loads of food with them they just didn't want to share, so when the bread and fishes or whatever got handed out they ate their own food instead. Cos people were just as greedy then as they are now.

GWEN: You've just ruined it, you know

OWEN: Yeah well, it's gullible people like you who mean that myths like that get put around in the first place

GWEN: Sorry?

OWEN: You want to believe everything. So you just accept all these ridiculous stories as true.

IANTO: Yeah, Gwen, you ought to stop. Next time we tell you there are aliens attacking Cardiff you should just stand there going "No! They don't exist!"

GWEN: And hope Owen gets eaten

IANTO: So, what makes miracles less believable than aliens, St Owen?

OWEN: Err…

GWEN: Go on

OWEN: For it to be more likely that it happened than it didn't you have to have lots of really reliable witnesses. Well-educated, that sort of thing.

IANTO: So aliens are more acceptable than miracles because we have Tosh?

OWEN: That wasn't what I meant

GWEN: Then what did you mean? And how educated do you have to be? And how many of you do there have to be?

OWEN: err… enough?

IANTO: Excellent theory, Owen.

OWEN: Yeah, well, I'm working on it.

GWEN: it needs a little work, yes. How come educated people are more trustworthy anyway?

OWEN: Because we're more scientific

GWEN: 'we'? I went to university too! And how does science help?

OWEN: physical evidence, that sort of stuff. Before we worked out scientific laws everything got counted as a miracle. That's why there're more miracles in the Bible than there are in our newspapers

GWEN: Apart from the fact that the Bible covers several thousand years and our newspapers don't. Anyway, maybe we've just got worse at recognising them

IANTO: Cardiff Daily Mail website, 4 minutes ago: "Three headed giant dog rampaging round Butetown."

GWEN: shit!

Conversation ends

**The saints are all real ones, as saints go. I didn't make any of them up. Not even St Drogo. **

**Please review. In my book, all reviewers are saints. **


	6. Pills, and Associated Problems

**My revision is working! I got full marks in my last timed essay! I've never done that before! **

**Thank you for all my reviewers for being so supportive and making me feel like I'm kind of working! Thedeejay, L.A.H.H., gernumblies, NikkieSheepie, MadCatta, milady dragon, Marian Locksley and specialfrancine! **

**I got a bit bored with all the God stuff so I decided to take a break and look at contraception instead (but it's still a weak T). Don't like, don't read. This little story's set at some point during Rhys and Gwen's marriage. So here goes… **

Pills, and Associated Problems

Gwen's head throbbed with every step she took – it felt as though a weevil was jumping up and down on it. She really didn't know how she'd managed to drag herself out of bed and into work, let alone drive her car. But now she's here, trying to blink away the spots behind her eyes as she waited for the cog door to roll open. Why did the stupid siren have to be so loud?

Owen passed by. "You look awful." he said conversationally, as Gwen leaned against the door, waiting for her head stop spinning. "Bad cold, eh? Don't give it to me."

"Thanks." Gwen croaked, putting as much sarcasm into her voice as she could manage. _You bastard _she thought privately. _You're a doctor. You're supposed to _care_ about my health. _But then again, she didn't really want any questions asked about this.

"Gwen?" Tosh asked concernedly. Gwen shot her a quick grin as she sat down with relief. _I must look bad if Tosh has noticed. Maybe I _should_ check with Owen… _

The warm stuffy atmosphere – Jack must have left the heating on overnight again – the bright lights and flickering screens, the mumbled sound of conversation, just out of hearing… Gwen's head felt scrambled again. She got the impression that if she closed her eyes for too long she'll tumble into the darkness. Everything seemed strangely distant and surreal.

"Gwen?" Jack's voice came suddenly from behind her. "Gwen, you're fainting."

"No'm not." Gwen tried to concentrate on her computer screen but was forced to close her eyes as the images blurred and spun again.

Jack caught her as she swayed. "Lie down on the floor."

Gwen obeyed. She had to admit that it felt better. "M'sorry."

"What did she do?" Owen asked as he rushed over. Gwen could see Tosh's worried face above her too.

"M'fine." She apologised, trying to sit up. "Oh shit."

Owen grinned slightly. "First rule of fainting: don't try to get back up again straight afterwards."

Gwen wasn't listening. "It's the drugs." She could hear herself explain, as Ianto placed a cup of water beside her.

"What drugs?"

"Owen's drugs. Like the pill?" She searched her memory. "Took it this morning. Contraceptives." She smiled slightly as she found the word.

Everyone else looked questioningly at Owen, who shrugged. "I didn't give her anything."

"I took them. From the cupboard. The ones you were talking about."

Tosh's face screwed up with a frown of consternation. "They were alien ones, Gwen!"

Jack plonked the bag of pills down on the table of the conference room, instantly drawing the gazes of Tosh, Owen and Ianto. Gwen was asleep on the sofa below.

"Who was it who investigated these?"

Tosh and Owen raised their hands tentatively. Owen added; "She will be alright, I swear. There's nothing too toxic in'em. It just unbalanced her system a bit, that's all."

Jack ignored him. "Why, if they were alien, did they end up in the medicine cabinet?"

No-one replied, so Jack answered his own question. "The reason is that this label -" he jabbed Owen's handwritten tag with his finger "- makes no mention of the fact that these are not for human consumption!"

Owen flared up defensively. "What else do you expect them to be in a place like this! Besides, I wasn't expecting anyone to come looking for contraceptives! Why didn't she just go on the bloody Pill?"

Jack frowned down out of the window. "She says she stopped taking it because she promised Rhys she would."

"Eh?"

"Oh!" Ianto looked up. "She was telling me about it. How Rhys wanted to start a family at some point, but she didn't because of all this lot." He waved a hand to take in the Hub. "She didn't think it'd be fair."

"So she thought up a solution only Gwen would." Owen remarked bitterly. "How isn't it fair, anyway?"

Tosh answered quietly. "Because she thinks her life's too dangerous to drag children into. And she believes that their future suffering is more important than anyone else's wishes. You know Gwen."

Jack frowned, seeing the point. He picked up the offending packet again. "This stuff's banned on some planets. They see it as the murder of unborn children."

"It's banned most places on this planet too." Ianto pointed out. "And most of the religions see it as a sin. But that doesn't necessarily mean it's wrong."

"It does if it means people are experimenting with alien drugs to keep their partner happy." Owen muttered. "I never got why all the religions see it as wrong, anyway. Surely we'd be overrun by now if nobody used it."

"It was different in the past though." Tosh spoke up. "People needed more children to start with because less survived."

Jack grinned broadly. "Oh, trust me, they've been using contraception for a long time. Even further back than I go. These," he weighed the bag in his hand, "are mainly from a relative of a plant the Greeks and Romans used to use, silphium, with a few other bits added."

"One argument I've heard against it is that if everyone did it we'd all die out." Ianto added.

"That's stupid." Owen scoffed. "What about artificial insemination? And what's so bad about us all dying out?"

Ianto raised an eyebrow at Jack. Neither of them could ever imagine Owen having kids.

"You'll like this one then, Owen." Tosh smiled. "One girl I met at university said that it's just another way of men controlling women, and that they just rely on us to take the Pill. I think she thought men ought to be more responsible, and have one of their own or something. She was a radical feminist, mind. I think she went as far as arguing for gender separation."

"Sounds cheerful." Owen tried to get his head around the idea. "So do you agree with her?"

"No." Tosh wrinkled her nose. "I wouldn't trust a man to take pills."

**Ok, I know that was really weird. Blame having to look after an 'ill' sister all morning (note extreme sarcasm on word 'ill') and an afternoon in school that very nearly degenerated into me doing what Gwen did. Again. Hence the concentration on what my-stupid-fainting-thing feels like and very little sensible discussion of the set topic. My apologies to all. **


	7. For Ever and Ever

**Magnas gratias ago a NikkieSheepie, thedeejay, milady dragon, L.A.H.H., Marian Locksley, FanGirl Moment xD, gernumblies, specialfrancine, et NewMind09. And that was my Latin revision for the evening. **

**This is possibly the most confusing topic on my syllabus, and I'm not sure I've explained it all that well (on the basis that I'm not even sure I fully understand it myself) , so please don't start headbanging if you get completely lost. It's possibly a good idea to take a breather every line or so. **

**The title (which _is _a quote, this time) is from a song, but I can't remember which one. Obviously, I do not own the lyrics to said song. If I did I would probably be able to remember the rest of them. And the title. **

For ever and ever

Owen leaned back in his chair and yawned. "I still don't get it." he announced.

Gwen shook her head too. "Me neither."

Ianto gave Tosh a small, apologetic smile.

That was the point where Tosh gave up. She had been a fool in the first place for trying. The others were good, but even she could barely get her head round this new time theory she had worked out. It did explain the Rift, and time travel and… well, and _everything_, she was sure it did, but trying to explain the whole thing to a group of people who normally only thought of time in the context of 'lunchtime' was like trying to teach Myfanwy table manners. Everyone just ended up frustrated and angry – the only difference was that this time they weren't all covered in barbecue sauce.

"Did you get any of it?"

"That bit about eternity was quite good. Very poetic."

"Science isn't about poetry, Gwen."

Gwen shrugged. "You and Owen keep trying to impose science on religion: why can't I impose poetry on science? Besides, it makes about as much sense."

Tosh sighed in despair. "Are there any questions?"

"Yeah." That was Owen, of course. No one else could manage to make a simple agreement so full of apathy. "What time's lunch?"

"I've got one." Ianto announced, ignoring Owen's remark, and determined to prove that at least one of them had understood something of Tosh's talk. "You're saying everything's subject to time – is God subject to time?"

Tosh blinked. Why were they bringing religion into everything lately? "Well, no, I guess you'd say He isn't. After all, if He created everything He created time too, so it wouldn't make sense for Him to be controlled by something He created."

"I'd be a bit like creating a new defence system and then locking yourself in with it." Owen remarked snidely. Tosh ignored him, blushing slightly at the mention of last week's… incident.

"And of course, God isn't meant to change either, and if you're in time you're subject to change."

"Unless you're Jack." Owen pointed out.

"Jack changes." Gwen said briefly, as though there was no argument about the fact.

Which there wasn't, when you thought about it.

"But if God can't change…" Ianto stopped to think. "Then He wouldn't be able to do anything, would He? Because that would mean He had to change. And that means no miracles or anything."

"And He couldn't answer prayers!" Gwen burst in. "And if He can't respond to people at all it doesn't really count as being loving, does it?"

"Who said He had to be loving?" Owen countered. "And I thought He was supposed to keep everything in the world working from outside, or some other nonsense, which is meant to count as being _loving_." The word 'loving' was served with a large portion of sarcasm.

"That's not the same." Gwen said stiffly. "Maybe… maybe…"

"Maybe?"

"Ok. Maybe God isn't eternal in that sense – being outside of time, or whatever - maybe He's in time but without an end or a beginning." She looked around to see if anyone else understood.

"Yeah, I kind of get it." Tosh admitted. "But I'm not sure it makes that much sense. So time passes for Him - so He can act in it - but He's still eternal."

"Does that include knowing the future? God's meant to know everything." Owen asked nastily, determined to do his best to shred Gwen's argument into tiny pieces.

"The future doesn't exist yet." Ianto pointed out. "It hasn't happened until you get there. So you can't know it."

"Alright." Owen demanded. "Gwen - what was God doing before He created the universe if He's just been hanging round forever? Not that I'm saying He created it." he added quickly and watched with delight as Gwen's face twisted into a frown.

"I don't know. But we can't know really, because it's God. Maybe He had another universe."

"I knew it!" Owen crowed. "The old fallback! 'We can't _possibly_ understand God.' So why do you keep trying?"

Gwen opened her mouth to shoot back a reply, but seeing that the two of them were about to begin another of their now-famous shouting matches, Ianto stepped in with another question. "If God was outside time, like Tosh first said, how would He see it? Would everything happen at once?"

"Yeah…" Tosh mused. "I guess it'd be a bit like seeing the whole of a film in the same moment rather than watching all the scenes normally."

"It'd be a bit boring." Gwen had calmed back down. "You'd know the ending right from the start. Only you wouldn't because there wouldn't really be an ending _or_ a start. Which is confusing."

"That doesn't work though." Ianto tried to think of a film he could use to explain it, but failed to think of one Tosh and Gwen would have watched which Owen would admit to having seen. He settled for a real life example instead. "That's like saying that at exactly the same time as we're sat here now we're all at home asleep yesterday evening. And eating lunch." Owens stomach rumbled. "And we haven't even been born yet. And that kind of stuff only happens in a time loop or with time travel. It doesn't make sense."

"Jack…" Gwen wondered aloud. "How do you explain _him_? He definitely doesn't work with the in-time thing – because if you travel back in time your past is in the future, and God wouldn't know it, but He should know it, because in a sense it's already happened…" She buried her head in her arms on the desk.

On cue, Jack appeared, lounging against a doorframe. "Ever heard about wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff?"

Owen slumped forwards onto the table. Through all the arguments and counter arguments and counter counter arguments he kept grasping one key fact in his head. It was nearly teatime. And they hadn't yet had lunch.

**Argh! Time makes my head spin far more than alien contraceptives! People have tried to explain it to me, but to be honest I still have problems making head or tail of it, especially all this eternity stuff. **

**Also, a little aside from Gwen, who would like to point out that she did not deliberately take alien contraceptives, but that she thought they were human ones, on the basis that no-one had written 'ALIEN' on the label. Hopefully she'll stop whinging about that now. **


	8. A Little Learning is a Dangerous Thing

**Thank you for all your reviews, which cheered me up wonderfully. I'm sorry I gave so many of you headaches. I'm afraid I'm about to do it again. Anyway, thanks to: NikkieSheepie, gernumblies, NewMind09, Marian Locksley, L.A.H.H., FanGirl Moment xD, milady dragon, specialfrancine and thedeejay for reviewing! **

**If it's in **_**italics **_**for ages it's someone's thought. I reckoned it might not be a bad idea to point out that little convention of mine, despite the fact that you've probably worked it out by now.**

A Little Learning is a Dangerous Thing

"_God, you know everything, don't you?"_

The words are still echoing in Tosh's head, Owens half-sarcastic, half-serious tone repeating itself again and again. _"God, you know everything, don't you?"_

Sometimes she wished she did. Sometimes she was glad she didn't. Nowadays it was more often the latter.

_That pendant… if God could read our thoughts… Why hasn't He got rid of all of us? Maybe He could see deeper, sees something even I couldn't. Maybe from his viewpoint all the good and bad blend together to form a perfect pattern… maybe… _

_But all that knowledge, all that stuff no-one else understands, all those thoughts you can share with no-one else because they just won't get them… I wonder if God ever feels lonely? _

"My wonderful Toshiko is brooding."

Tosh looked up at the sound of Jack's voice. "I was thinking what it'd be like to know everything."

"More philosophy, eh? Ianto's even hidden a textbook under his bed."

_If I was omniscient, _Tosh thought _I'd know how Jack knows that Ianto's got a philosophy textbook under his bed. And I'm not sure I want to know that. _

"It's interesting."

"Here's a poser for you then. Say I _knew_ in advance what you were going to have for tea tonight; beans, pasta, roast camel, whatever. Do you then have a choice as to whether you eat that or not?"

"Roast camel?"

"It was just an example. You can have weevil casserole if you like."

Tosh pulled a face at the very idea. "I think if I tried I'd end up _being_ a weevil casserole."

"That's not the point. If you know the future, and your knowledge is never wrong, can the future change? And are anyone else's actions freely chosen, or are you in control?"

"No. Not really. But you can't know the future, can you? Because it hasn't happened yet. Oh no!" Tosh paused. "This goes back to that argument we had last week, doesn't it? The time one?"

Jack grinned in reply. There was a certain satisfaction to being able to explain – well, almost being able to explain – a concept so bizarre that even Tosh had problems getting her head round it. But then again, it wasn't as though there was a definite, achievable answer, and Tosh hated that.

"So we're talking about God again?"

"Uh huh"

"Right. Ok." Tosh paused to think. "With the 'God-is-outside-time' thing He must know the future because He knows the whole of time. And since He can't be wrong that means everything has to happen that way. But with the 'God-exists-in-time' thing the future hasn't happened, so it can't be known. Which means that we're still free to make choices."

Jack raised an eyebrow. "Very good."

"You're wrong." Owen said shortly as he walked past.

"Sorry?"

"I said: You're wrong." Owen paused and turned round. "God's meant to be non-physical, yeah? And that means He hasn't got eyes or ears or any sensory organs whatsoever. So how's He meant to get knowledge?"

"But knowledge is non-physical too." Tosh pointed out reasonably.

"Maybe He _is_ knowledge." Gwen suggested brightly. Jack smiled to himself slightly: his team were drawn to arguments the same way wasps were drawn to picnics. Only in a slightly better sense.

"Go away and join a conversation you can understand, Cooper."

Something heavy bounced off Owen's shoulder. "Oi!"

Jack took the opportunity to take the conversation a little further. "So, assuming that God exists, is omniscient and exists outside time, did Gwen throw that stapler at Owen from her own free will?"

"No. He provoked me."

"I did not, you bitch! All I did was make one little suggestion and you decided to chuck a bloody stapler at me!"

"Yeah, but if God knew she would do that…"

"Then He's a bastard for not stopping her." Owen sat down on a chair and made a show of examining his arm. "This could be fractured, you know."

No one replied. It was possible that no one cared.

"He could know that she'd _choose _that." Tosh pondered. "But that would mean almost the same thing. Because if He knows without doubt what you're going to choose you're not really choosing it."

Ianto interrupted as he placed the mid-mid morning coffees on the table. "If He's outside time he can't know 'in advance' anyway. There is no 'in advance' or 'the future' because it's all just one."

"That doesn't change anything." Tosh argued. "He still knows it."

"But if God knows what you're going to do then nothing you do is your fault." Gwen complained.

"Yeah, we covered that bit ages back."

"Shut up, Owen. But that makes heaven and hell a bit unfair, because it's not your fault you committed a crime. _And _God knew where you were going to end up for the beginning. So it doesn't really matter what you do at all."

Owen looked a little blank, so Ianto put this idea into context. "Gwen's saying she can throw as many staplers at you as she likes and it won't affect her chances of getting into heaven one bit."

"What about pens?"

"Yep, they're covered as well. All part of the divine plan." Ianto suppressed a slight smile at Gwen's evil grin.

"Hey!"

"Oh, come on, that didn't even hurt!"

"You may have a ticket to the afterlife already, but I can still make your life on earth one living hell, Gwen Cooper!"

Tosh sighed to herself. She imagined Hell as being trapped in a small room with Gwen and Owen arguing with each other. "How about God just knows all possible futures. That way we can still make free choices, because until you make the choice it's not decided which future you end up in."

Jack smiled. They were finally beginning to think properly. "You'd better start doing penance then, Gwen, if that's the case."

"I'll be an angel." Gwen promised.

"It's a bit like the weather." Tosh hadn't taken in any of Jack and Gwen's brief conversation.

"What?"

"Like when you say 'I'll do that if it rains, and that if it's sunny.' You know the possibilities for the future but you don't know exactly what will happen. Only as it approaches it becomes clearer what's going to happen."

"Except in Cardiff." Ianto pointed out, his face perfectly straight. "In exactly two week's time, it'll be raining."

He was right too.

**I would have written and posted this last night, but I was prevented by partially-foreseen circumstances involving needles, injections and the sort of results that Gwen gets from taking alien contraceptives. Only worse. **

**Oh, and thanks to Alexander Pope for the quote. **


	9. A Dog has the Soul of a Philosopher

**The normal (but still very special!) chorus of thanks to all my reviewers – milady dragon. L.A.H.H., thedeejay, FanGirl Moment xD, Ravenja70, NikkieSheepie, Marian Locksley, ukdramafan, gernumblies and specialfrancine! **

**This is quite definitely set before Owen's death (as are most of the other chapters) as it's hard enough trying to discuss life after death, the soul etc when you have Jack to try and fit in, let alone Owen as well. ****Oh, and there's a bit swearing, because no one turned up to interrupt Gwen and Owen soon enough. You have been warned. **

**Title is a quote from Plato. I'm not entirely sure what he meant. But it sort of fits. **

A Dog has the Soul of a Philosopher

Owen was bored. Very, very bored.

Ianto had once remarked that a bored Owen was rather like a bomb waiting to go off – if you didn't defuse it in time it was likely that a lot of things would get destroyed. Furniture, friendships… that sort of thing. The only time anyone could remember him doing anything creative was when he'd decided to label everything in the tourist office with post-it notes.

At the moment, Owen knew there were two things which would stop him being bored. One was a rift alert, but they were rather hard to engineer. The other was a good old Torchwood argument, which were easier to organise but carried a greater risk of loss of life. Or limb. Or hearing.

Owen briefly considered standing in the middle of the Hub and yelling "Group debate!", or perhaps something slightly more provocative. But then he had an idea that he thought might find him an argument a little faster.

"Do you believe in souls?"

Gwen looked up, startled by his aggressive tone. "Yes. Why?"

"Where is it?"

"Sorry?"

"Where's your soul? Because I've never seen one when I'm doing an autopsy."

"You can't find it. It's not physical. It just is."

Owen snorted. "A non-physical thing affecting a physical thing. You can tell you're not a scientist, Gwen."

"Well, I suppose you think we haven't got one."

"We haven't. It's all just biological and psychological."

"Oh, come on, there's more to it that that! Don't you ever feel that there's some things science just can't explain?"

"No."

"Well there is."

"No there isn't. You're no more than a bundle of cells – you're just naïve enough to believe you have a soul because you can't accept the truth that this is it."

"I am _not_ naïve! _You're _naïve if you think you can explain everything through bloody hormones! What about hope and love and-"

"'Love' doesn't exist. It's all just hormones and instinct."

"How would you know? You've never loved anyone! There is something, something deeper, something that doesn't change…"

"Everything changes. You're not the same person you were when you were six - physically at least." Owen grinned to himself at that one.

"There's still something the same! That bit that makes you you! Otherwise there's no point to anything!"

"You're deluded. There's no evidence, anywhere, that souls exist!"

"Just because _you _haven't got one!"

"No, I don't! None of us do! We're just bodies, and that's it! None of your divine consciousness or spirit or any other nonsense!"

"There is something! Even plants and animals and aliens have got it! There's a bit of us that's a bit of something bigger, like we're all part of each other…"

"You're out of your bloody mind! We should be sending you off to a mental hospital! This is _it_, don't you get it Gwen? This is fucking IT!"

"Well it can't be because then there's no bloody point! There's no point in morals or trying to be good…"

"Welcome to the world, Gwen Cooper. We can all do whatever we bloody well like because it doesn't change _anything_."

"Yes it does! Just because you don't… Ow! Get off! Owen!"

"OWEN!"

They both froze at the sound of Jack's voice. "What the hell is going on?"

Owen stood up and brushed some dust off the front of his shirt nonchalantly. "We were just having a philosophical discussion."

"He bloody _bit_ me!"

"Does Gwen normally end up being pushed to the floor at the end of religious debates?"

"I was just illustrating a point."

"You _bit_ me!"

"Yeah, I bit you. Get over it."

"Owen - my office. Now."

Sometimes, Jack felt as though he was running a primary school.

"So, did anything interesting happen while we were away?" Tosh asked jokily, having finished her account of her and Ianto's epic capture of a small swarm of alien bees.

Jack gave a slight grin as he accepted a cup of coffee off Ianto, looking at him gratefully. They'd have to stop sending him on field missions so often – he wasn't sure how they'd survived the four hours without the magic of coffee. Maybe that's why they'd all been so irritable.

"Oh, nothing much. Owen just got bored and decided to try a bit of Gwen-baiting, that's all."

Ianto took a sip from his own mug. "Any major casualties?"

"Apart from Gwen now having to explain to her boyfriend why she's got a set of human teeth marks in her shoulder, no."

Ianto suppressed a slight smirk.

"What were they arguing about?" Tosh asked curiously. Their usual arguments didn't normally go _that_ far.

"The existence of the soul. Philosophy really is a very dangerous thing."

"Let me guess." Ianto pretended to screw up his forehead in thought. "Gwen believes in it and Owen doesn't."

"Exactly."

"What about you?"

Jack shrugged. "I like to think I do. Most of the time I don't really know. But sometimes it sort of makes sense."

Tosh nodded. "I think there is something more to life, but you always wonder if it's just wishful thinking. It would be nice if there was."

Jack turned to Ianto, who mirrored his shrug. "Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. It depends mostly on how depressed I'm feeling."

Tosh smiled. "I think Owen prefers the word 'realistic'."

Ianto nodded solemnly. "I really wouldn't want to start an argument with him about it. Has anyone checked Gwen for rabies yet?"

**Hopefully that argument was a little easier to follow that the last! I wouldn't have spent so long on it, but I needed to get it out of the way before I tackle life after death (not literally! (hopefully)). **

**I know I seem to be overusing Gwen and Owen, but I have two good reasons for this. Firstly, they're the ones I see as having the most polarised views on God's existence and its associated issues (Owen always comes across as an atheist in the series, and Gwen does at some point mention a belief in heaven), and secondly, they're the most argumentative. **


	10. The Omnipresent MotherInLaw

**Thanks to all my amazing reviewers: NikkieSheeepie, thedeejay, gernumblies, milady dragon, Tacroy, Marian Locksley, Torchwood Cousins, Fangirl Moment xD, specialfrancine, L.A.H.H. and Ravenja70!**

**I'm doing conscience this time, because I've got a mock exam on it soon. (That's a lie - I started writing this yestersay, and had the practice essay today. but it made sense to finish it)**

**The title's based on a quote by H. - "Conscience is a mother-in-law whose visit never ends." - which I thought was quite witty. Only I had to shorten it down to fit in the chapter title box.**

The Omnipresent Mother-In-Law

"No." Jack said firmly as he blocked Owen's path, finality in every syllable.

"What? I wasn't doing anything."

Owen, Jack noticed, didn't do playing innocent very well. "You were heading across to start another argument with Gwen."

Owen stared Jack in the face. "What makes you think that?"

"You've got that tetchy I-want-to-kick-someone's-ass look about you."

"No! I'm just thinking. Hard."

"A tetchy I-want-to-bite-someone's-shoulder look."

"Yeah? So?"

"So I'm going to give you an argument you'll never forget."

Owen stared at Jack again. "About what?"

Jack grinned. Owen wondered what on earth he'd just let himself in for. "Well, after your little tirade at Gwen I was kind of wondering what you thought about conscience…"

"Conscience?"

"The thing Gwen claims you don't have. And Ianto too, for that matter."

Owe scowled. "You mean the little voice inside your head that tells you off for doing the fun stuff?"

"Ah. So you have one but you don't listen to it."

"I never said I believed in it." Owen crashed down on his chair at his desk determined to be argumentative. "Though there is a bit of you that deals with making choices, I guess."

"Well, let's call that bit the conscience. Where does it come from?"

"You tell me."

"What if I said 'God'?"

"I'd laugh at you. Are you going to?"

"Think about it logically, Owen. A little voice inside your head telling you what's right. Why couldn't it be God? He is meant to know what's right and wrong."

"Because He doesn't exist."

"But if He did…"

"It still wouldn't work, cos different people see different things as good. Like that spaceship that came through last week where all the Halgywahtevers on it thought it was a sin _not_ to steal whatever they came across. Including my bloody car keys."

"I don't see why God couldn't give different races different morals. Maybe it's His way of making the universe more intereseting."

"Yeah, so He can laugh at me not having car keys. Anyway, _our_ morals change too. One day we'll be in shock at the idea of…"

Jack raised an eyebrow. "The kind of things I do, yeah?"

"…and by the time we reach wherever you're from we'll just accept it."

"So what's your explanation for conscience then?"

"Simple. It's all psychological. Everyone tells us when we're kids not to do something and it gets ingrained in us, cos we're still scared someone's going to punish us. That thing you call a conscience is just a way of controlling us all."

"That's a bit of a morbid view, isn't it, Owen?" Tosh enquired as she made her way past.

"He was arguing that love's just chemicals the other day." Gwen yelled over.

"Oh, yeah, Cooper." Owen smirked. "What did your boyfriend say about…" His gaze swept meaningfully to her shoulder and Gwen's hand moved instinctively to cover it.

"Oh, we had a bit of an argument. That's all."

Owen's smirk grew even wider, if that were possible.

"About God's omnipotence." Gwen added. Owen's face fell.

"What's your view on conscience then, Tosh?" Jack asked.

"Um… Well, I agree with Owen that it's shaped by society, but that doesn't make it a totally bad thing. I mean, it means we can live together in communities together, and that means we've got a better chance of surviving."

"Good point." Ianto had arrived, completing the debating team. "Imagine what this place would be like if we had no morals at all, and just solved arguments by biting each other."

"Want to find out?" Owen asked nastily.

"He'll be baring his fangs next." Gwen commented, though she did draw back a little. She'd had experience of Owen's teeth.

"I suppose you think I'm listening to God's voice telling me not to attack Teaboy right now."

"No, I don't, actually." Gwen paused to glare at him properly. "I don't think we have a separate conscience. I think… I think we kind of _are_ a conscience. Because we're aware – well, most of us are aware – that we have to try and do the right thing."

"But it could be God who made us like that."

"Do you actually believe that conscience is from God, or are you just playing devil's advocate?" Owen demanded of Jack.

Jack just gave him a grin that could only be described as devilish. "How about this then? God gave us the ability to think so that we could work out right and wrong. It's still kind of from God, but it means we can get it wrong."

"_Can_ we get it wrong?" Gwen asked. "I reckon it's only wrong if you don't follow your conscience."

Owen sneered. "So even if you're brought up thinking it's fine to go around murdering people-"

"Or biting them."

"-shut up, Teaboy – so that it becomes part of your conscience, and then you follow that, that's fine?"

"Well…"

"You don't really think so, do you?"

"No." Gwen admitted, then added defensively; "But it works if you say it's from God!"

"That theory does work normally though." Tosh pointed out. "Not many people get brought up like that. And who says all these morals are the same everywhere, anyway? You were saying earlier that it depends on what you were taught, so really you're sort of arguing against yourself."

"Am I?"

"Yes."

"Oh. Yeah. Forget it, Gwen."

"I'm lost now."

"Yeah, me too."

There was a brief pause.

"So, what's the silent Welshman got to say on the subject of conscience?"

"We haven't got one, sir."

"How do we make moral decisions then?" Tosh asked. "We've got to have something."

"No, you don't understand. We still make moral decisions, but 'conscience' is just an empty concept. Saying 'my conscience says'… well, it's just another way of saying 'I think'. That's all."

"Very deep, Ianto, very deep."

"Thank you, sir."

"So if I thought 'Hell, Teaboy's shoulder looks tasty…'"

"No, Owen. Ianto's mine. All biting rights belong to me."

Tosh and Gwen glanced at each other, and made to go. Behind them, they can hear the debate turning into a full scale argument.

"That is just sick, Harkness!"

"Why? You bit, Gwen, didn't you? At least Ianto's willing. Aren't you, Ianto?"

Ianto hurried after the girls, not looking back. "They both need muzzles." He said grimly.

"And collars." said Gwen happily. "Ones saying 'If found, please do not return to Torchwood Three, The Water Tower, Cardiff Bay…'"

**Soon to come: Life after death, God's omnipotence, marriage, lying, omnipotence, God's love, free will, 'good', homosexuality, the environment and Torchwood's ethical code. Plus a few others. If I can fit them all in. But first I've got to fill in Gwen and Rhys' conversation, since poor Rhys hasn't had a say in any of this yet. If anyone had any ideas about ways to write any of the others, I would be very grateful. **


	11. Is Anything Too Hard For the Lord?

**Another huge set of thanks to my wondrous reviewers, who include this time: thedeejay, gernumblies, specialfrancine, milady dragon, L.A.H.H., Marian Locksley, puppylove, NikkieSheepie, deeta, Ravenja70 and FanGirl Moment xD! I've never had this many reviews for a Torchwood story before! **

**This is catch-up-on-the-aforementioned-Gwen/Rhys-argument time. I thought I'd give you a nice biblical quote as a title (Genesis 18) to show you just how long people have been pondering this one. (It doesn't say it in there, but I expect most of them got almighty headaches from it too.)**

Is Anything Too Hard For the Lord? 

Gwen knows exactly what Rhys is looking at. She's seen it herself. Two arcs of little red marks, mirroring each other either side of her shoulder. And she's got a good idea what he's thinking too.

"One of my workmates." She explained casually, pulling on a jacket. "We got into an argument and he thought biting me would prove a point."

"What point, love?" Rhys sounded worried. Maybe she's made it sound a bit too like she was being abused at work. Which she probably was in a way, she thought to herself with a slight smile.

"That we don't have souls, there's nothing after death, and therefore we can do whatever we want. Including biting co-workers." Gwen grimaced.

"Which one?" Rhys asked carefully. "Jack?"

"No, Owen."

"The scrawny one?"

"That's him."

"Well tell him if he does it again I'll… I'll…"

"You'll…?"

Rhys gave a vivid description, which involved several points Tosh would disagree with from an astrophysicist's point of view, a few more Owen would disagree with from a doctor's point of view, and many, many more which he would disagree with from Owen's point of view.

"I'm not sure you _can_ do that."

"I can try."

"I don't think _anyone_ can do that."

"I bet God can. I'll ask him."

Gwen buried her head between her knees. "It's catching, isn't it? This philosophy thing?"

"Well, you did bite me…"

"Shut up." Gwen paused. "You know, I don't think God could do that either. Not send someone back in time and kill themselves like that in the past so that they were never there in the future. It's logically impossible."

"If He's God, he wrote all the laws of logic in the first place, didn't He? He created the world, so He can do whatever He likes in it."

"But that would mean that He could… oh, what's the old question? – He could create a rock that's too heavy to lift _and _lift it. Or make a square triangle. Or a… a married bachelor…"

Rhys grinned. "Yep! Me!"

"… and He could…"

"Ok, love, I get the point. You want me to drop the 'anything' bit for now. So God can only do things that are possible." He shrugged. "I'm still not convinced, you know."

But Gwen was frowning over a different problem. "I don't think that version works either! There are _loads_ of things that are possible to do that God can't!"

"Eh?"

"Like - oh, I don't know – climbing trees. He can't do that because He isn't physical."

"He could do it through people."

"Yeah, but if He can do anything that's possible he could kill people or deal drugs or commit incest… all the stuff He can't do because He's meant to be loving and good. He can't do _those_ through people, cos that means he's allowing it."

"Doesn't He kill people in the Bible? Smiting and all that?" Rhys made a thunderbolt gesture, and narrowly missed knocking over the cup of tea on the table next to him.

"Only in the old half. I don't think people take that bit too seriously anymore."

"Oh. Right. Well, in that case I guess you're confusing us and God."

It was Gwen's turn to look puzzled.

"Our logic's different from God's, right? On the basis of him knowing more, yeah? So just 'cos something's logical for us doesn't mean it is for Him…"

"So He can only do things that fit in with Him being God!" Gwen exclaimed. "Which gets rid of all the climbing trees and sinning! Yes!"

Rhys smiled – it was rare for Gwen to be so happy in the middle of an argument. "I'm still not convinced."

"Why not?"

"God's not _really_ all-powerful anymore if you say that. If He's in control of this universe and the laws of logic and everything He should be able to do whatever He likes. You're limiting Him, and the only person who should be able to do that is God Himself. And I bet that's what He does do – chooses to restrict what He can do so that… so that things are like this for us."

"You're too good at this."

"Yeah, well we get boring times at work too, you know. Just we don't liven them up by biting people."

Gwen thought back to the original problem. "God couldn't do that to anyone – He can't change history. It'd be like contradicting Himself."

Rhys snorted, in a way that sounded too much like Owen for Gwen's comfort. "Of course He can. He's in charge of time. He could have changed the whole of history just now and you would never know."

"Ugh. I'm not sure I like the idea of that."

"Have I won then? Do I get to bite you?"

"No you haven't and no you don't!"

Rhys chuckled and stretched out on the sofa. "That's the problem with teaching everyone philosophy, Gwen. They start asking questions. You'll start an uprising!"

Gwen rolled her eyes as she sat down next to him. "Power to the people! Biting rights for all!"

Rhys grinned. "On second thoughts, let's stop the revolution here, shall we?"

**I had a plan for what to do next but I've forgotten it now. Does anyone have any ideas for how to start one off on life after death? I'd like to get it out of the way soon.**


	12. Going up to the Spirit in the Sky

**Today was my last EVER day at school, which is quite weird. Weird but nice. Just like the number of reviews I'm getting for what are, when all's said and done, philosophy revision notes. So thank you to: NikkieSheepie, Ravenja70, ZeMightyPikachu, Allons-y allonso, milady dragon, Marian Locksley, L.A.H.H., puppylove, thedeejay, specialfrancine, gernumblies and FanGirl Moment xD for being totally amazing people!**

**Here goes. It's not the easiest one to write, but I gave it a try. The problem with life after death is that I'm trying to keep the discussions fairly light-hearted (apart from occasional unprovoked attacks) and life after death isn't the most light-hearted topic.**

**N.B. Owen is still fully alive in this, to save unnecessary complications. **

Going up to the Spirit in the Sky

The first thing Jack saw when he came back was Ianto's face. On the whole, he thought, it wasn't the worst awakening he had had.

"You alright, sir?" Ianto bit his lip as soon as the words slipped out. It was obvious that Jack wasn't alright – not emotionally or mentally at least.

It was Owen who defused the situation. He probably hadn't been intending to, but he did. "Do you reckon we make that God-awful gasping noise when we arrive in heaven?"

"I thought you didn't believe in heaven." Gwen commented.

Owen didn't believe in heaven one jot, but he was prepared to override this belief long enough to start off another argument. "Why did you think _that_?"

"Well, you don't believe in a soul, or that we can survive without a body, so how can you possibly believe that we live on after death?" Gwen stated matter-of-factly, as Ianto helped Jack to sit up.

"The same way Jack does. Only _our_ new body gets put somewhere else – heaven. The body's still alive, there's an afterlife, and you don't need a soul." Owen was quite pleased with this quick solution, though he still preferred his own position.

"Problem." Ianto announced, "How come our dead body is still quite clearly here?"

Owen thought quickly. "The new one's a copy of the old one. Same body, same memories… same everything."

"So you'll have a hole in your chest if you've just been shot?" Tosh asked sceptically. "Oops – sorry Jack."

"It's fine."

"No. You're… you're a perfect version of you."

"Just like me!"

"Can it, Harkness."

"But then how does anyone recognise you?"

"Can't you just leave it, Gwen! We just do, alright!"

"So, Owen." Jack was sat back up again properly now, examining the hole in his shirt. "Say a cloning machine fell through the Rift that could do everything you just said and we used it to clone _you_. I don't know why. Maybe we were just bored or something. Or suicidal. But the point is - would you be happy if I then poisoned you and told you that it was fine because there would be an exact copy of Owen walking around?"

"No!"

"Why not?"

"Because you'd have killed me, and you're not meant to do that 'cos you're my boss. But more the 'dead' bit than the 'boss' bit."

"Devil's advocate." Ianto murmured quietly.

"What do you really believe in, Owen?" Tosh asked curiously.

"Me? After death? Nothing. Death's it. The End. Kaput. Pow." Owen waved his hands around a little, presumably in a vague attempt to show life dissipating into nothingness.

"Kaput?" Ianto asked, bewildered.

"But there's _tonnes_ of evidence to say that there's life after death!" Gwen exclaimed.

"Like what?"

Ianto broke into a sudden fit of coughing, in which the words "cough Jack cough Harkness cough" could be heard.

"He doesn't count."

"Hey!"

"Other people have come back to life too."

"His name's Jesus, Gwen. And there's no totally reliable evidence that he actually rose from the dead."

"Near death experiences, people seeing bright lights and feeling at peace when actually they're dieing, ghosts, mediums… isn't that enough evidence for you?"

"All the 'near-death-experiences' are just the way the body reacts to extreme stress." Owen explained, as though to a six-year old. "You can get the same effects from taking drugs."

"But what about reports of people speaking to the dead…?"

"Frauds." To everyone's surprise it was Ianto who had replied so bluntly. "Mediums either research you beforehand or they make educated guesses based on what you say and what you look like."

Gwen looked very put out, and both Owen and Ianto could see that she was determined to continue to believe that she was right.

"Tell you the best rising-from-the-dead fraud story ever." Jack said heartily, trying to diffuse the tension. "It was in medieval France, I think, and this mountebank walked into a town and told everyone that he could raise the dead. Of course, they asked him to prove it. So he promised that he would go to the churchyard in three days time and bring everyone who had died in the past year or so back to life. And of course they all thought he was joking, but he kept reassuring them that he would. After a while a few people got worried and came and begged him not to raise their dead relatives – all those people who'd remarried or finally got their hand on their parent's money. Most of them paid him. And eventually the whole town was so scared that the town council paid him to go away. So he left the town with a huge bag of cash without having to prove anything."

Owen grinned. "We could try that – I bet the government would believe we could. We could squeeze loads of money out of them! Why are you grinning like that, Tosh?"

"You're all sitting round having a chat about life after death and saying no-one except Jack comes back to life… but they do! We've seen it!" Tosh looked round at the blank faces. "The Resurrection Glove, remember? We _brought_ _people back to life_!

We even managed it with Gwen!"

"But they all said…" Ianto trailed off.

"…There's nothing." Jack finished. "Just blackness and waiting."

Ianto looked sideways at him. "Is that what it's like for…?"

Jack nodded.

"But that doesn't prove anything!" Gwen said, possibly a little too loudly. She quietened her voice a tone. "If God knows that in the future you're going to end up coming back to life, like Jack or Suzie, then why would He let you go to heaven? What would be the point in giving you a sneak preview and then sending you straight back here?"

Owen frowned at Gwen. "You know, Cooper, for once you might have had a decent idea." Gwen's eyes lit up. "_If _there was a soul that could go to heaven!"

"You haven't proved that." Gwen said stiffly. "And even the 'blackness and waiting' thing suggests that there _is_ a bit of you that's not attached to your body."

Owen snorted. "Heaven's a stupid idea anyway."

Ianto nodded quietly. "There are a lot of problems with it. Aside from all the what-are-you-like-when-you-get-there? Questions we mentioned earlier, you have to ask whether it's fair to reward or punish people eternally, and why God didn't just put us in heaven in the first place."

"You don't have to have heaven to survive death." Tosh spoke up quietly.

"Why? What do you believe in, Tosh?" The other three fell silent as Jack asked.

Tosh blushed. "I think… The thing I believe in most… I'm not sure but… Reincarnation."

"That the one where you get reborn in a new body?" Owen asked. "Why do you believe in it?" His tone, for once, was sincere.

"Everything else gets recycled. Water, rock, elements, atoms… Energy doesn't just disappear. It goes somewhere. And life's a kind of energy so it should go somewhere too. It can't just _go_. I mean, I'm not sure if there's any bit of _you_ that survives, like a soul or anything, but I do think the life force gets used again."

Gwen smiled softly. "That does kind of work, yeah. I wonder what I'll be next time, if it's true?"

"I'd be more interested in what you were before." Owen grinned. "Probably a dog."

"Yeah, well I bet you were a rat." Gwen teased. "A squeaky little rat with big sharp teeth… Or maybe a flea."

"What about me?"

"Hmm… I think a rabbit, Tosh." Owen grinned again. "And Teaboy must have been…"

"A coffee plant?" Ianto suggested.

Owen looked like he was about to make another, probably slightly more offensive, suggestion, so Gwen piped up again. "What about Jack? What might he have been? A cat or something?"

"I know exactly what I was." Jack said proudly. "I remember it perfectly."

"He was exactly the same as he is now." Ianto said exasperatedly. "Only without the huge bloodstained hole in the middle of the shirt I bought for him last Christmas."

**Whoah, that ran on longer than expected!**

**Thanks to L.A.H.H. for the 'sneak preview' theory, as well as for the ideas form all my other (wonderful) reviewers which prodded me in the right direction for writing that. You're suggestions really are very helpful, which is why I would like to say 'what is good?' to you as a chapter title, and hope that you'll send me some amazing suggestions and scenarios to start me off. I'm sorry for all those who want topics like homosexuality – I promise I will write chapters on them, but first I need to write my actual revision notes to work off. **


	13. Is Morality Just a Shouting Competition?

**I seem to have converted most of you to reincarnation. It worries me a little that I have that much influence. I could indoctrinate you into anything! **

**Thanks for all the lovely reviews: NikkieSheepie, Tacroy, thedeejay, milady dragon, specialfrancine, Marian Locksley, L.A.H.H., gernumblies, deeta, Allons-y allonso and Grey the Mad Camel! **

**The title is from a quote by Charles Stephenson: "If moral statements are just expressions of feeling it makes debating moral issues merely a case of who can shout loudest." **

Is Morality Just a Shouting Competition?

_Gwen must be starting to grow on me._ Tosh thought. _I'd never have wondered this much about something before. But was it right? What we did? I know Gwen's not happy with it, and Jack doesn't seem to care – or at least he isn't showing it. But then he never does… Stop staring at him! _

"Deep thoughts, Tosh?"

"Just… what happened."

Jack's silent, and through the silence she can hear Gwen and Owen yelling at each other downstairs, not at all friendly this time.

"Why did you do it! We could have helped him!"

"What else was I meant to do!"

"You didn't have to shoot him!"

"It was the right thing, Gwen!"

"No it wasn't! It wasn't!"

Tosh looked up at Jack again. "I don't know what's right anymore." she said softly. "I used to think I did. But not since I joined this place."

"I know how you feel." Gwen agreed as she climbed up the stairs to join them. She sounded exhausted.

Ianto, standing quietly in the corner, nodded.

Jack tried to see things from their perspective. It wasn't easy. He had seen a lot in his long lifetime, and the event they'd just played a part in wasn't the worst. It had turned out that the string of suspicious murders they'd been investigating had all been committed by a young man possessed by something – as yet unidentified – that had come through the Rift. Owen had shot him.

"We could have done something." Gwen repeated. "Like with Carys. I wasn't _his_ fault. What Owen did was _wrong_."

"Define 'wrong'." Owen snarled.

"Wrong _is_ wrong. Killing innocent people is wrong!"

"He was about to stab Tosh! She's innocent too!"

"You could have stunned him, or something!"

"I did the right thing, Gwen. Stop arguing!"

"Why can't I argue? _You're _wrong! And we can't _both_ be right!"

"Actually, you can." Ianto said calmly. It shut them up, at least. "There doesn't have to be an ultimate truth about anything."

"There should be about _murder_!"

"It wasn't murder! It was self-defence!"

Jack took a deep breath. "Both of you calm down. What's done is done. We can't go back and change it now."

"But we can prevent it happening again." Gwen said stubbornly. Tosh nodded. She felt semi-responsible for Owen's actions. If she hadn't been stood where she was…

Ianto smiled to himself. "We need a Torchwood ethic."

"You been reading again?" Jack asked. Ianto nodded in reply. "Sounds like a good idea. How do we start?"

"Well, first you have to decide what good is. That's where most theories trip up."

Gwen frowned. "But it's obvious what good is. It's just… good. You can't describe it. But you know when you've _got _to do something – it's like intuition. You don't think it through; you just _know_."

"And how do you know you're 'intuiting' it right, or whatever?" Owen demanded. "How come we don't always agree? We should be intuiting the same thing, and we're not. Solve that!"

"Maybe _your_ intuition's wrong!"

"I don't like the intuition thing." Tosh confessed. "Isn't it easier just to look at the consequences? That things are good if they have a happy outcome, and bad if they don't?"

Owen grinned widely. "Define 'happy'"

"Oh, don't go into that again. Happiness is obvious, isn't it?"

"No it isn't. I killed that guy, and you lot are unhappy because an innocent man died. If I hadn't killed him, someone else would have got hurt – probably you, Tosh – and we'd still be unhappy. Probably more unhappy. So by your own theory what I did was right."

"'Good' isn't a property something has anyway." Ianto announced. "Maybe something like happiness is a property, but you can ask if that is good. And a property can't have a property, so good can't be a property."

Owen's forehead screwed up. "I don't get that last bit, but the start sounded about right. I think I agree with you about something for once, Teaboy!"

"Why, what do you think 'good' is?" Gwen asked, intrigued.

"It isn't anything, really. Just a way of showing opinions. Saying something's wrong is just the same as saying 'boo to whatever-it-is'. There isn't some ultimate list of what's right and what's wrong."

"But that's…" Gwen's words failed her. "You can't just say that saying 'genocide is wrong' is the same as saying 'boo to genocide'! You might just as well say that… well it's like saying that red is a better colour than blue. It's totally meaningless!"

"Red _is_ a better colour than blue." Ianto said quietly. "Sorry, Jack."

Owen had that grin on his face again. "Exactly. Except it's not _totally_ meaningless – it's just giving your opinion. And I suppose you're trying to convert people to that opinion too."

"Well, judging from your earlier conversation with Gwen…" It was the first time Jack had joined in with the argument. "But the fact that people do change opinions – not Gwen, obviously, but other people do – kind of suggests that one opinion is better than another. And your theory's trying to deny that at the same time."

"But one opinion _is_ better." Owen explained, as though this was totally obvious.

"You mean yours?" Tosh, asked, slightly more sarcastically than she had meant to.

"Of course."

"Maybe people's views of right and wrong change because their feeling change, or because of some new experience they've had." Ianto suggested.

"So you're in the 'there's no definitive right or wrong' boat too?" Jack inquired casually.

"Not quite. I don't think statements just tell other people our emotions. I think they say what everyone ought to do, too. So you're commending an action and saying that everyone else ought to do the same thing. But it's still just your personal opinion."

"How's that different to Owen's?" Gwen asked. "You can still do whatever the hell you like! And there's no reason for anything! At least ours had some kind of reason!"

"What, 'follow your heart'?"

"Tosh's was based on evidence! And your theories mean that you can just change your morals as you go along to suit yourself!"

"And don't you?"

"In some things, yes, but there are some things I will always believe are wrong." Gwen said firmly, not rising to the bait.

"You still haven't got anywhere." Jack pointed out, an amused look in his eye. "This is exactly why Torchwood doesn't have morals."

"But we do." Tosh argued. "We wouldn't do what we do if we didn't think it was the right thing to do."

"How do you work things out, Jack?" Ianto asked. His head was starting to hurt now. How on earth did Jack cope with all the dilemmas he had to face every day as the leader of a place like Torchwood?

"I kinda use a mix of all of them, I think. I follow my 'intuitions' or whatever, but they're based on things like working out the consequences and my feelings and opinions and what I think others should do. And I think there are some things that are always wrong. I've been to a lot of places, and a lot of the key morals stay the same. But then sometimes they're not." Jack seemed to be getting in a muddle too, by this point. "Who cares? What I say is right – that's all you need to know."

"Well, that was a satisfying answer." Owen remarked, in a voice that suggested that it was not satisfying in the slightest. "So what happens if we disagree with you?"

Jack drummed his fingers on the table in a foreboding way. "Didn't you know that the Torchwood moral code allow operatives to be shot if they disobey their leader's orders?"

"No."

"Actually, sir, there's nothing in our rules that says that. Anywhere." Ianto was careful to make this last point clear.

"Isn't there? I'll have to add it in." Jack grinned round at them all. "It would make life a bit more fun, wouldn't it?"

**This chapter doesn't please me particularly, but I've only got two weeks left now, including several days when I'm away from home for most of the day. And though I could still manage in-depth philosophical conversations on those days I don't actually have access to a laptop. So things are getting a little rushed at this end. **

**On another note, purple is quite definitely the best colour. **

**So, what do you think about good?**


	14. Unpacking Both Boxes

**Many thanks to all my wondrous reviewers, who are helping me through my revision! thedeejay, NikkieSheepie, specialfrancine, milady dragon, deeta, gernumblies, FanGirl moment xD, L.A.H.H. and Marian Locksley. **

"**The inner box unpacks the outer at the same time as the outer box unpacks the inner." Jostein Gaarder's 'The Solitaire Mystery' again. It's a great book, and explains this concept better than I can. **

**It took a while to write, mostly due to a jumble at the end garnered from around my bedroom and my story files. You'll see… **

Unpacking Both Boxes

The sheet of paper fluttered down down and down and rested on the ground like a promise.

As one, the team looked at it.

Rift spikes within the Hub itself were rare. Even rarer were ones where the result of the spike was neither a rampaging alien, a ticking bomb nor a deadly disease from another era.

"Do you think it's safe?" Gwen whispered, as though the piece of paper might have ears.

_Hang this_ Owen thought and strolled over. "Everyone stand by in case I get a paper-cut."

"Owen…" Jack warned, knowing full well that appearances can often be deceptive. But it was too late.

"One A4 sheet of paper. White, with typing."

"That could have been the most dangerous thing that has ever come through the Rift. You know the protocol, Owen. We do _not_ just pick up random pieces of space junk on the assumption that they're harmless!"

"Unless we're Jack Harkness." Ianto muttered. "It's just a piece of paper. Hardly dangerous. "

"What language is it in?" Tosh asked, her eyes lighting up at this sudden opportunity. This could be the Rosetta stone of alien speech! "Is it alien?"

"Nah, sorry Tosh. Definitely English."

"Well what does it _say_ then?" Gwen demanded.

Owen scanned the first line. Then he reread it. "You don't want to know." He announced, slightly shakily. He read the second and third lines, and felt the insides of his stomach squirm. More and more with every word. _Holy shit_! he thought, and paused to read more. _And that. And that. _

Jack snatched it off him, and read:

'"_Well what does it say then?" Gwen demanded. _

_Owen scanned the first line. Then he reread it. "You don't want to know." He announced, slightly shakily. He read the second and third lines, and felt the insides of his stomach squirm. More and more with every word. _Holy shit!_ he thought, and paused to read more. _And that. And that.

_Jack snatched it off him, and read… Oh, just reread the above bit if you haven't worked it out by now. I can't be bothered writing it out again or the whole thing will just get circular.' _

Jack looked round at them all. The others were all staring at him.

"What's wrong?" Tosh asked.

Jack checked the sheet of paper. Tosh's comment was there too.

"It's got our entire conversation written on it. Every single word." Jack glanced down and was irked to see that he'd unwittingly mimicked the text before him. It even told him so.

"It knew what I was thinking." Owen said shakily. _That means Jack can read what I'm thinking now? God, I hope not. _

"Sorry Owen." Jack replied, and mentally kicked himself as he continued reading.

Gwen looked in between the two of them. "But that's impossible!" She exclaimed, reading off the script without knowing it.

Jack scanned ahead to check that this wasn't just changing as he read it:

'"_Maybe it's a time loop?" Tosh suggested. "One of us has written it in the future…"'_

"Maybe it's a time loop?" Tosh suggested. "One of us has written it in the future…"

'"_With perfect recall?" Owen interrupted, trying to hide his worry with sarcasm. "And knowing everyone's thoughts?"' _

"With perfect recall?" Owen interrupted, trying to hide his worry with sarcasm. "And knowing everyone's thoughts?"

'"_Well, what's the other alternative?" Gwen demanded. "That someone else is dictating what _we're_ going to say, like we're just characters in a bloody story?" She hated even the thought of that idea.' _

"Well, what's the other alternative?" Gwen demanded. "That someone else is dictating what _we're _going to say, like we're just characters in a bloody story?" She hated even the thought of that idea.

'"_It's still doing it, isn't it?" Ianto asked.' _

"It's still doing it, isn't it?" Ianto asked.

Jack looked up. "Just one more line to go… yeah, said it. That's it. Finito."

"Thank God." Gwen murmured. "That was…"

"Creepy." Owen finished. "Really, really creepy."

"How do we know it's ended?" Tosh asked, examining the piece of paper. "How do we know there aren't more somewhere? That our whole lives aren't just being written by something else?"

"We don't." said Ianto morosely. "Our whole lives could be controlled and we wouldn't even know it. No real choices, no freedom… Cheerful thought, isn't it?"

"But we're breaking out now then, aren't we?" Gwen asked. "If we're realising that we're figments of someone's imagination like that then we're escaping, yes?"

"But that could be controlled too." Owen pointed out, successfully crushing that option.

"But I'm not controlled! I'm a free human being! I can make decisions!"

"Just because we think we're free doesn't mean we are." Tosh replied quietly.

"It's all determined anyway." Owen stated. "Forget about _that_ –" he waved his hands at the piece of paper "- we never had any freedom in the first place."

"Of course we do! I made a free decision when, when…" Gwen cast around for an example. "When I joined this place!"

Jack gave a short bark of laughter which made everyone turn to look at him. "No you didn't. We manipulated you; I manipulated you. You never really had a choice. You were always going to choose us – we played on your natural curiosity and you took the bait."

"But that curiosity's not controlled! It's part of me! I chose to be like that!"

"Genetics." said Owen shortly. "Upbringing. Everything that's ever happened before. It's all just one big chain of cause and effect, and we're the poor sods who have to put up with it."

Tosh had put her head in her hands. "That theory… if that's right we're not to blame for _anything_ we do. Theft, murder… you can't punish people, or anything! Gwen's right – we must have some kind of freedom. This can't just be some kind of puppet show!"

Owen shrugged. "We can't both be right."

"You are both right." Ianto said suddenly. "Because everything _is_ caused. Our actions are determined by our choices and feelings, and everything that's happened before. But if it's caused by something internal – like a choice – then you still have some control and freedom."

"Nice theory." Jack commented. "I like it."

"Doesn't help much with _this_ though, does it?" Owen snarled, gesturing towards the piece of paper again.

"Just because it says everything doesn't mean it's causing everything." Tosh replied thoughtfully. "It could just be a record of what we're doing. Someone could be watching us, or know what we're doing somehow, but that doesn't mean they're in control."

That argument was mutually accepted, for fear of the consequences should it not be true.

Later, Jack made a thorough search of the Hub. There was nothing on the ground floor, but Myfanwy's nest was full of shredded scraps of paper, most of them no longer legible. Jack could barely read any of the torn, inkstained scraps of handwritten notes. Some were on post-it notes, others looked more like they'd been ripped from a diary:

'_12.15 Catch a bus… qui quae quod… one good RE result (35/35 on the miracles essay!)… PILLS… nearly 18 and still haven't kissed anyone… get collected from party at 11?... finance talk wasn't much help… PEMBROKE – smile! … vivamus, mea Lesbia, et amemus…. Think it's something more than that. Think. Heh. Oh, how do I know? _

They didn't make much sense, so Jack picked out a few typed ones:

'"…_you bitch! All I did was make one little suggestion and you decided to chuck a bloody stapler at me!" _

"_Yeah, but if God knew she would do that…" _

"_Then He's a bastard…"' _

Jack remembered that conversation. But there were other bits he didn't recognise so readily, and some scraps were a lot more worrying than a team brawl:

'"_Some sort of emergency system's been triggered, the lower floor's flooding and Ianto's trapped down there…'"' …Tosh had forgotten about Owen. She had forgotten about most things…''…No-one else died that day…_'_ '_…._Gwen screamed with pain as she was dragged across the floor…' '…last time you stood here Ianto was still alive'._

Jack threw the scraps of paper from his hands.

One sheet landed, face up, covered in spidery scrawl, and glared at him as he walked away.

"_What if we're all just imaginary? I write stories, but sometimes it seems more like the stories are writing themselves. Same with mine. My personal story, I mean. It's more like a fairytale, sometimes. It's all such a mess. I can't make head or tail of it. But it's so weird, when you just get glimpses of them, or hear their voices in your head. You _know_ what they're going to say. Except sometimes you don't, and they choose to go down a different road entirely. _

_I can see why God doesn't show his face much. Creator and created. It wasn't meant to be. In the end, most of us just don't want to know." _


	15. We Live and Love

**Thanks to all my reviewers AGAIN! Ooh, I love you all! Thedeejay, Allons-y allonso, gernumblies, milady dragon, specialfrancine, Cautious Cupkake, L.A.H.H., FanGirl Moment xD, Grey The Mad Camel, NikkieSheepie and Marian Locksley. **

**So here it is, at long last. The chapter most of you have been waiting for. Homosexuality. I assume no-one has problems with it as a topic on the basis that you're Torchwood fans **

**Set some point just around/after 'They Keep Killing Suzie', since that's where I see Jack & Ianto's relationship beginning, if I remember rightly. Which I probably don't. **

**Title is from Catullus, whose poetry, despite being almost two millennia old, is still an inspiration and a comfort to me. **

We Live and Love

Really, Ianto knew that the person he was supposed to talk about any issues he had with was Jack, but, well, that wasn't really an option. After that it was Gwen, as the team's people person, but he didn't think she was quite the person at the moment either. And Owen was out of the question. No, the desk he was heading to was Tosh's - patient, reliable Tosh's - because he had a feeling that she would understand. And that she needed to talk too.

Tosh sees him standing there, two cups of steaming coffee on a tray and a sort of pleading look in his eye, and knows what he wants. "Somewhere else?" she suggests. He nods gratefully, and they move up to the little tourist office.

There's an uncomfortable silence after Ianto has found them both seats, but he finally finds the words to fill it.

"Me and Jack…" It tails off into a question.

"What about it?"

"Everything. Nothing."

Tosh nods and lets him continue.

"It feels right and wrong at the same time… It's like I'm betraying Lisa" Ianto's voice still goes soft over the name, "and my parents."

Tosh doesn't ask what he means by the last bit. "I did too." She smiles. "I still think they might disown me if they find out."

Ianto shakes his head. "I think they're ok with it in principle – my mam is at least – but it being me... I don't think they think I could be like that. And the fact that it's Jack…"

"They might forgive you with that. Anyone would, once they'd seen Jack." Tosh tries to be light-hearted, and is aware that she sounds a bit too much like Gwen. But it's still a topic she doesn't like discussing; one she wants to skirt round. Not just relationships like this but relationships in general.

"But he's my boss. It feels…" Ianto trails off again.

"That doesn't matter." Tosh said emphatically. "_My_ last love affair was with an alien who wanted to kill us all." God, she hasn't been this blunt in years. Ever, maybe. Especially about something which still rubs raw. But she thinks this is what Ianto needs.

"So you think I should?" Ianto's face lights up hopefully, and Tosh realises at the same time both what he wants her to say and how young he still is.

"I'm not the best person for this kind of advice, but, yes, I think you should. Just try it and see, if that's the way you feel. I'm sure Jack will let you back out if it doesn't work."

"Thanks." Ianto sounds preoccupied, and Tosh guesses that he's still trying to work out how he feels and what he should do. "I'll just… take these back down."

Tosh smiles at him as he hurriedly seizes the tray and bears it away, Gwen squeezing past him as he makes his way out.

"Hi Tosh." Gwen gets straight to the point. "Were you talking to him about Jack?"

"Gwen…" There's a warning note in Tosh's voice.

"Alright, alright!" Gwen holds her hands up. "Look, I wasn't wanting to gossip, I just want him to be happy. Alright? How are you?"

"I'm doing ok." Tosh answered resignedly. She has grown used to this near-daily inquisition.

"Really." Gwen says seriously, taking up Ianto's vacant seat. "About…"

"Mary? It's fine. I'm over it."

Gwen examined her carefully and finally decided that Tosh was telling near enough to the truth. Tosh _was_ too – she had accepted that Mary had been far from what she had thought she was. She had been distraught at first, even if she hadn't shown it, but it hadn't taken her too long to realise that she had lost the Mary she loved long before Jack had killed her. _That_ Mary had never even existed.

"Was that the first time?" Gwen blurted out. "The first time you've loved a woman, I mean. I've been meaning to ask ever since, but, well…"

Tosh frowned at her. "You're not…"

Gwen shook her head violently. "No! I was, just, well, wondering. What it was like. You know."

"That was the first proper time, yes." Tosh confessed.

"So it was just because of Mary?"

Tosh played with her fingers a bit. "Sort of. But I've felt like that before."

"Who?" Gwen pounced on the question like a cat.

"Just a friend." Tosh saw the faint glint of worry creep into the back of Gwen's eyes and quickly added "Someone I knew at university." _Why am I telling her all this? _She wondered.

Gwen searched for words. "That must have been nice."

Tosh smiled. "She was amazing. Just like me. We read each other's minds some of the time, practically." Her eyes glazed over slightly as she remembered.

"But you lost contact, then?"

"Yeah. But it never got anywhere anyway. It took us months to confess to each other how we felt, but nothing really happened after that."

"Perhaps she was a bit too much like you." Gwen suggested.

"Sorry?"

"Well, shouldn't have said anything really, it doesn't matter…"

"What?"

"Too… too shy and unsure, you know? And maybe too reasoning? That you both followed your heads rather than your hearts." Gwen looked up at Tosh earnestly. "I think you need to do a bit less of that, sometimes."

Tosh sighed. "I think that sometimes. And then I think that it doesn't matter anyway, because, well, no-one wants me anyway. Only people who want to use me. I'm not like you. I'm not forward or brave or pretty…"

"You're bloody gorgeous, Tosh. Seriously."

Tosh looks up into Gwen's eyes. "Then why…?"

"Just try and be more confident. Don't bother waiting until you're sure, just _be _sure and go for it. You'll find someone. I'm certain." Gwen smiled at her.

_Yeah. _Thinks Tosh bitterly._ Maybe I have found someone. But he's too wrapped up in you to notice me. And _you _haven't realised either. Oh, Gwen. _

"You ok?" Gwen asked, concernedly.

"I'm fine." said Tosh, and smiled back.


	16. The Torchwood Guide to Ethics

The Torchwood Guide to Ethics

Ianto smiled to himself as he placed something in the middle of the conference table, causing the others to look up briefly from the Chinese they were eating. "Look what came through the tourist office door this morning."

Gwen put down her fork (she always made such a mess with chopsticks) and picked up the flyer, reading the title out loud. "_'Is your business ethical?_' What a daft question! Why are people posting that through the door?"

"They're checking to make sure it's being run in the best way possible. Environmentally friendly, workers rights, treating customers well… all that sort of thing."

"Hhhmm…" Owen drew the syllable out in a mock-thoughtful way. "Let me see. Is Torchwood ethical? We have to work underground, we frequently have to get up and come into work in the middle of the night, we're constantly at risk of death either from the Rift or from boredom…" He counted the reasons off on his fingers. "We use more energy than most of the rest of the Bay put together, kill off rare species, live solely off Chinese and pizza... and, oh yes, most of our job consists of imprisoning, torturing or killing other living things. That sounds quite ethical to me, yeah."

"Better that Tesco's" Ianto muttered.

"You just have a grudge against them because they won't let us shop there since that incident with the exploding lizards." Gwen admonished him.

"But surely we are quite ethical, on the whole?" Tosh asked. "I mean, we are trying to do good and save lives, and – let's be honest – we probably do a better job at that than if we didn't exist. Cardiff probably wouldn't still be here if we weren't, so we've got to be good in the long run."

"Depends on the way you look at it." Jack said. "If you look at the act or the consequences. Some people would disagree that it's fine to sacrifice a few people if it saves more lives in the end, because you're still deliberately causing those people to die, which is wrong."

"That's just stupid." Owen complained. "More people end up dying."

"But of course you think that!" Tosh retaliated. "If we thought like that there'd be no way we'd work for this place!"

"So we are ethical and we aren't." Ianto mused. "That clears things up a bit."

"Does it count if we're trying to be ethical?" Gwen asked. "Like, if we're trying to do the right thing?"

"Well," Jack stated, glancing at Ianto "I've been flicking through Ianto's 'Guide to impressing your friends with philosophy' again…"

"It's not called that!"

"Yeah, yeah… And I think what you're trying to say, Gwen, is that an act is good if it practices virtues and helps you become a better person."

"Am I?"

"What are virtues?" Owen asked.

"Things like courage and honesty and wisdom and loyalty." Tosh explained.

"Most people would agree that you lack a few of them." Ianto added.

"Oi!"

"Well, Torchwood does them." Gwen said decisively. "Bravery and intelligence and all that."

"Or foolhardiness and arrogance." Ianto pointed out.

"Here's a question, then." Jack announced slowly, moving his gaze round to each of them in turn. "Is it ethical to steal pens from work?"

"What?" Gwen asked, a little too suddenly.

"Theft?" Ianto clarified. Jack nodded. "No, I don't think it's very ethical. On the virtues thing it's greedy, and most people agree stealing is wrong. Even if it's from a business. I mean, it all comes off the budget. It could mean less money to buy weapons and equipment, in our case, so I suppose it would be wrong unless whatever was stolen was needed more somewhere else."

"Hmm." Jack said, in much the same way Owen had earlier. "What about internet misuse?"

Ianto did his best to ignore Owen's expression. "Well, it's wasting company time and money and it's lazy and selfish… nah, it's not really ethical either. It's only really bringing _you_ good, no-one else."

"And using technology at home without your boss's permission?"

"That's lying, and it could be leaking company secrets too, so no. Unless it was doing more good at home, but I suppose if it was something like the technology we've got the dangers probably outweigh the advantages." Ianto deliberately didn't look at Tosh, who was blushing furiously.

"Good thing none of those things happen here!" Jack said cheerfully. "Otherwise we'd be very unethical indeed!"

There was general nodding and murmured agreements all around, then the others made excuses to go, leaving Jack and Ianto alone at the table. It was only a few seconds before they both started grinning.

"Excellent work, Ianto Jones!" Jack announced, passing the flyer back to Ianto.

"Oh, it didn't take long to type up. Good work on the discussion."

"You did all the work." Jack pointed out. "I just asked the questions."

"And before you ask, conning your work-mates is not ethical either." Ianto told him.

"Isn't it? But it's so much fun!"

"Unfortunately so are most things you're not supposed to do at work, sir."

"Does this have anything to do with all those CCTV videos, Ianto?" There was warning tone in Jack's voice.

"Oh, no sir. Of course not. I never even _dreamed _of the idea."

"Lying to your boss is unethical too, Ianto."

Ianto sighed. "We don't really score very well on the ethical scale at all, do we?"

Jack nodded. "It might be best if we just gave up morals altogether, don't you think? All those unhelpful little rules. Life would be much more fun. What do you say?"

Ianto's eyes did one of their characteristic _only Jack_ rolls. "When I've finished the filing, sir."


	17. I Think Therefore I'm Single

**There could be potential bad language, sexual references etc in this, judging from the two lines of speech which prompted the whole thing. Just a warning. Nothing outside normal Torchwood standards, I'm sure.**

**I looked through a lot of good feminism quotes, and while this isn't the best it is one of the shortest. **

I Think Therefore I'm Single

The arguments over who got to drive the SUV had been forgotten in the aftermath of the discovery of what Jack now referred to as 'Ianto's little mistake' (although admittedly only when Ianto wasn't there). But it was inevitable that they would arise again, Torchwood being who they were.

"But you can't park! Women can't park!"

"We _can_ park, Owen! I can park, Tosh can park…"

"Excuse me, but I've seen how you leave your car in the morning, skewed across two parking spaces…"

"Forgive me if I'm wrong." Tosh interjected. "But who was it who managed to crash into that bollard yesterday?"

"We were chasing a weevil! Do you expect me to park perfectly when we're trying to catch a rampaging alien?"

"Well, you did crash into it again on the way out."

"Only because you lot were being so distracting in the back."

"So maybe we should drive and _you_ should sit in the back." Gwen suggested.

"Or in the boot." Tosh added. "Providing we haven't got a weevil with us."

"Look, women aren't _meant_ to drive cars like that. It's a man's car. It looks bad enough having you two sat in it."

"So you're suggesting that we should sit back here whilst you get to do all the interesting stuff?" Gwen's voice had suddenly turned icy.

Owen, of course, failed to pick up on the tonal change. "Yes."

"And do what, exactly?"

"Cleaning, cooking, ironing… you know. All the stuff women are meant to do."

"Right." said Gwen. And that, for once, was the end of the argument.

It took Owen a few days to notice that neither Gwen nor Tosh were speaking to him, and a few more to notice that they were rather than just being hapless they were actually being deliberately uncooperative. Tosh refused to help fix one of his medical systems, Gwen pointedly ignored the reports he passed to her…

Jack was quite bewildered until Ianto explained to him. "I think Owen tried to define women's role in society to them, Sir, and they didn't take to it much."

"Ah." was all Jack said. They decided to watch and see how things played out, and whether or not Owen learnt his lesson.

Things came to a head when Gwen and Tosh both refused to get in the SUV with Owen, at which point Jack intervened and was forced to resort to ordering them both to come on the mission.

When they all returned, the first thing Jack did was to order a team meeting.

"It's gender discrimination in the workplace." Gwen explained.

"That may be so, but I don't think socially isolating Owen is an approved strategy for dealing with it, even if it is amusing."

Ianto cleared his throat. "You're supposed to report it to Jack, and he's got to deal with it."

"Which is what I am doing." Jack paused. "What exactly did Owen say, anyway?"

"He… he sort of implied that women are only good at home and that men are superior." Tosh answered.

"But it's true!" Owen protested, his eyes glinting. "They should all be good wives and stay at home and look after the kids and…"

Noticing the murderous look creeping into Gwen's eye, Jack quickly intervened. "And I take it you two think that that's not true."

"Of course." Gwen snapped. "We're equal. God, the law's recognised that for more than half a century now! It's just a bloody social construct you lot made up to try and control us…"

"Yeah, and if you were incapable of realising that and not entering into marriages you knew were going to be like that then that says that you _ought _to be treated like that, 'cos you can't look after yourselves!"

"You bastard, Owen Harper…!"

"Gwen!" Jack barked, silencing both of them. "If we can't sort this out sensibly then there are going to be an awful lot more complaints when I start controlling what _all _of you do a bit more. Understood?"

"So much for freedom." Ianto muttered.

Tosh sighed. "Please can we just have a general consensus that women are equal to men in relationships and all the rest of it? And then we can get back to normal?"

Owen held up his hands. "Ok, ok. You're equal. God, can't you lot take a joke?"

Gwen just glared at him. Watching her, Jack couldn't resist taking over Owen's role and winding her up a bit more.

"And so you all assume that both partners in a relationship are always equal?" He asked, sounding slightly amused.

Gwen frowned. "Yes."

Owen nodded. "If they both agree, yeah." Then he remembers a certain small phial he used to own (well, borrow) and amends his argument a little. "No trickery or anything."

Jack just smiled. "Not necessarily. I mean, suppose I asked Gwen to sleep with me…"

"You what?"

"… then she wouldn't really have any freedom to choose."

"Why not?" Gwen demanded angrily.

"I'm your boss. I could order you to."

"Well then I'd bloody quit, wouldn't I?"

"But then we'd retcon you." said Owen happily, catching on to what Jack was getting at.

"And we could always retrospectively change her details." Tosh added thoughtfully.

Owen nodded enthusiastically. "We could give her really bad job references or a criminal record… Could we get her in prison?"

"Easy." Ianto announced. "You'd just get her framed for a murder. We've got the bodies. And we set up DNA evidence like that all the time."

"But…" Gwen protested, suddenly feeling very trapped.

"Not quite so simple after all, is it?" Jack asked. "You know, I could do that for _all_ of you."

There was a sudden silence.

"Only if you want to spend the rest of your lives at the bottom of Cardiff Bay with your feet in a concrete block." Owen snarled in reply, then added as an afterthought: "I wouldn't mind just Gwen though."

"Thanks, Owen." said Gwen bitterly.

"Oh, come on, you wouldn't _mind_…"

Ianto coughed loudly. "If nobody minds, there are reports which need to be written up, and we still need to explain to the theatre just exactly why their stalls were infested with giant fanged butterflies."

Grumbling, the others left the room, leaving Jack and Ianto on their own.

"You going to ask me if our relationship's unequal?" Jack asked.

Ianto shook his head. "No, sir. I already know it is."

Jack looked worried, wondering if he might have gone a bit far in his explanation. "Look, Ianto…"

"It was a bit unfair, I admit. You knew full well that if you didn't agree you'd never get any decent coffee again."

Jack smiled. "Or biscuits."

"Or biscuits." Ianto agreed.

**A little light philosophy makes a nice change.**


	18. Equal Rights?

**Thanks to everyone who cheered up an otherwise boring, revision-filled day with their reviews: milady dragon, deeta, FanGirl moment xD, L.A.H.H., thedeejay, specialfrancine, NikkieSheepie, gernumblies and Tacroy. And good luck to anyone else doing exams! **

**After reading through everyone's suggestions I thought I had the characters all worked out for this one, and that their views were obvious, but then I thought 'no…' And I ended up with this. If you think I got anyone's opinion wrong, please don't hesitate to tell me in a review. **

**I would have tried to find a better title, but the quotes were starting to make me feel sick. **

Equal Rights

She had thought it would be a hard discussion to start. In the end it was only too easy.

"I'm bored." Owen announced, causing Ianto to roll his eyes at the ceiling. A great deal of Owen's conversations seemed to start this way.

Gwen stuck to the script. "And?"

"I want to have an argument."

"We should go into law." Ianto sighed. "Or politics. What about?"

"We've covered most things now, I think." Gwen pointed out. "Everything you can have a decent debate about, anyway."

"Not abortion, though." Tosh suggested nonchalantly.

"There isn't an argument there." Owen replied, and Ianto nodded in agreement.

Gwen frowned, tearing her gaze away from Tosh. "Yes there is! There's whether or not it should be used, for a start!"

The two contrasting replies merged, leaving Gwen to try and untangle the 'shoulds' and 'shouldn'ts'.

"How is it right?" she asked Owen.

"I didn't say that! It's completely wrong! _He's_ the bastard who think it's fine!"

Ianto blinked innocently at Gwen and Tosh.

"Hang on…" Gwen looked between the two of them. "Owen, are you actually taking the 'don't kill the cute little innocent embryo' stance?"

"Yes." Owen sniffed at the strange expressions they all gave him. "Apart from when the mother's life is threatened or the baby's not going to survive anyway. What?" he demanded, looking round at them all. "Have you any idea how many people come to the NHS because they want kids but can't have them? And then there's people throwing them away like they're worthless trash."

"But it keeps the population in check." Ianto pointed out.

"Yeah, mass murder tends to do that, Teaboy."

"It's not the same. They're just bundles of cells. If we didn't use it, there'd be a lot more people on this planet than it could support, and everyone would be a lot worse off. Famine, wars… more people would die in the end."

"Would you use that as an excuse to murder little children?"

"No."

"But it's just the same. An embryo can feel pain from around fourteen weeks old. _That _makes it murder."

Out of the corner of her eye, Gwen saw Tosh's hand move almost imperceptibly over her stomach.

"But you said you should allow it if the baby's too severely handicapped." Ianto said stubbornly. "What if it's going to be born to some family in Africa which already has seven kids? Where they can't afford to feed or care for another one?"

"Better that that kid should have a chance than that it should die before it even sets foot in the world. And there is a thing called 'birth control'. If they can't feed the kids they've got they shouldn't be trying to get more."

"What if the mother was raped?" Ianto persisted. "You'd make her keep the baby then?"

Gwen, keeping half an eye on the duelling pair and half on Tosh, still couldn't fail to notice the latter's reaction to that comment.

"Why not? It's not the kid's fault. And she can always have it adopted. Have you any idea how long the waiting lists are to adopt newborns? People are _desperate_ for kids."

"But - "

"It's the woman's choice." Gwen said quietly, so that all three turned to look at her. "It's her body: It's her choice."

"Well that makes you a selfish little bitch, doesn't it Gwen?"

"No, Owen, it doesn't." Jack announced, leaning over the rails of one of the walkways above them. "Now, aside from expounding your moral views on issues you're never personally going to have to deal with, could you please get on with some actual work, like I pay you to. You too, Ianto."

He made a move to follow Tosh's retreating back, but Gwen got there first and he decided to leave them to it. His own experiences on the matter probably weren't what either of them was looking for right now.

"The girls got a bit touchy about all that, didn't they?" Owen commented, shaking his head in bewilderment.

"Tosh? Tosh?"

"I'm fine, Gwen." Tosh replied, the quaver in her voice saying something else.

"Tosh, sweetheart, Owen might not be capable of noticing when someone else is upset, but…" Gwen broke off and chose to pull Tosh into a hug instead. "When?" She asked simply.

"I…I don't know. I mean, I haven't… haven't… Oh, Gwen, I don't know what to do! I only found out yesterday! And I think it… it happened back in those days none of us remember anything about…" Tosh swallowed, and Gwen hugged her tighter.

"I know. Rhys says I didn't even recognise him. So you've no idea who's…?"

"No." Tosh whispered. "It could be anyone's. It could even be alien. I haven't checked."

'_Anyone's…' _Gwen thought. _'God, it could be Jack's or Owen's or Ianto's… None of us remember a thing!' _Out loud she said "You should check. We must have something that can do that, right?"

"Uh-huh." Tosh nodded, as Gwen slowly released her. "If not I can convert the Hub equipment… But what should I do if it's normal?" The panicky tone had entered her voice again.

Gwen tried to think of a way of phrasing the thoughts that were running through her head so that Tosh would not be offended. "I don't think… I don't think that you've really got it in you to be a mother, if you know what I mean."

Tosh nodded, accepting this. "But Owen said…"

"It's your choice, not Owen's." Jack said firmly from just behind them, causing both women to whirl round in surprise. "Toshiko, I've sent the other two home, so you don't need to worry about anything they might think. Now follow me – Gwen's right that we need to get you checked out."

"It's human." Tosh said mutedly, around half an hour later.

"Yeah…" Jack paused to think, watching the way Tosh's fingers tightened round Gwen's, trying to find the best path for all of them. "But there's still something not quite right about it… Look, Toshiko, I'll be blunt. We know nothing about the circumstances behind this, and I _hate _that." He tried to smile down at her. "I would suggest that it would be for the best if we got rid of it. Just to be on the safe side."

Tosh seemed to relax a little, as though she was glad someone had finally made a decision for her. "If you think so. But will Owen…?"

"No. I'll sort it all out. And it's not that far gone, is it?" He was already fetching things, sensing that Tosh just needed to get this over and done with.

"Want me to stay?" Gwen asked.

"Yeah." said Tosh hoarsely.

**Ugh. I think I actually converted myself while I thought this through. I started off with something akin to Ianto's view, and now I know what happens next… Yep, it's a personal decision in the end. And I agree with contraceptives, but not, in most cases, with abortion. How about you? Did Tosh/Jack make the right choice?**

**Thanks for L.A.H.H. for the statistics Owen quotes. I am much indebted. **

**So… any other suggestions? If you do send me one please also try and give some ideas of a situation it could be used in too, because finding one tends to be the hardest part. (Oh, and deeta, I know you suggested 'eternity', but I'm pretty certain I've already done it. And I can't actually get my head round it, so I find it very confusing to write about. But I may still try and bring it in at some point.) **


	19. Cogito Ergo Sum

**The quote is from Descartes. Translated from the Latin it means 'I think, therefore I am'. And I'm afraid (yet again) that I can't remember who requested this. Here it is, anyway.**

Cogito Ergo Sum

"Ianto? Ianto?" The vision of Jack's large hand being waved in front of his eyes suddenly broke in on Ianto's consciousness.

Distantly he heard someone remark; "He's been like that for an hour now." Owen, he realised.

"Just staring into space." That was Gwen. Her voice sounded fuzzy. And… and someone else. Tosh?

"I've checked the powder – it _was_ a hallucinogen." Hallucinogen. That, that meant…

"Jack?"

"Welcome back to the world, Ianto Jones!"

He could feel Owen's fingers at his wrist, checking his pulse, and he focused properly to see the doctor's eyes staring into his.

"He's fine." Owen announced. "Any good dreams?" He smirked a little as he said it.

"Yes. No." Ianto tried to remember. He knew it had seemed really, really real when he'd been in it, but now recalling it was like trying to catch the wind. "Sort of… normal."

"Normal as in like your normal life?" Gwen asked.

"No… normal normal." Ianto realised he wasn't making much sense. "I was an accountant." He remembered finally. "You know? With a house in the suburbs and a wife and two kids… all that kind of thing."

"Sounds dead boring." Owen commented. "Is that your secret desire then, to be an accountant?"

"I hope not." Jack said disappointedly. "Ianto?"

"No, I don't think so. But it did feel…"

Everyone looked at him quizzically as he trailed off. "Real?" he finished, knowing it sounded stupid.

"Maybe it was." Tosh suggested, cutting through Owen's snort.

Jack frowned. "Are you suggesting that that drug transported Ianto's consciousness to someone else's body so he felt as if he shared their especially boring life?"

"No. Just, maybe…" Tosh blushed. "Maybe we're the dream."

"It would make sense." Gwen said thoughtfully. "I mean, most of the things we do at Torchwood are pretty unreal and dream-like. Most people only get chased by aliens in their nightmares."

"Sorry?" Owen asked incredulously. "You're saying _this _is all just some mass hallucination?"

"It doesn't have to be mass." Tosh smiled slightly. "You could all be products of _my _imagination."

"Actually, Tosh, I think you'll find that _I'm _the real one around here, thank you very much. Though why the hell I had to imagine you lot, of all things…"

"But you don't choose dreams." Gwen argued. "Otherwise why does anyone ever have nightmares?"

"Mmhmm. Why should I listen, eh? You're just the product of my masochistic imagination."

"Same." Ianto replied.

"I'm not real." Jack announced.

"Sorry?"

"How could I possibly be anything but a dream? I'm just too good to be true." Jack gave them all one of his dazzling grins.

"Smug bastard. Trust me to dream up a man who can't die so he can torment me without end." Owen moaned. "I could have had anything. _Anything._"

"Aw, come on, we're not that bad!" Gwen teased him.

"And the pain's only illusory anyway." Tosh added. "Imaginary people causing you imaginary pain."

"So if I cause _them_ pain, it doesn't matter, right?" Owen looked purposefully towards the medical bay and his tray of scalpels. "'Cos I reckon you'd all be a lot more bearable if…."

"Owen." Jack cautioned.

Owen just grinned back at him. "You're mine, aren't you? I can do anything I like."

"I exist." Gwen said hurriedly.

"Prove it."

"You know I can't. You can only prove it to yourself. But I do exist."

"But then if I'm the imaginary one – which I'm not – I'd just be causing you imaginary pain…"

"Owen, can you cut all the creepy threats." Jack demanded.

"Possibly _imaginary_ creepy threats." Tosh corrected him.

Ianto closed his eyes. "I think I preferred the original theory that we _all _exist. Even if it meant we were stuck with Owen."

"Which would you choose then?" Jack asked him. "This or that normal life?"

"This one. It's far more fun. Apart from the paperwork."

"And the coffee's good." Gwen remarked. "Anyway, I've had both."

"What, coffee and paperwork?"

"No, real life and this."

"So have we all. Except Jack."

"Ah, this is my normal life. You should see my weird one."

"Don't want to, thanks." Owen sniffed.

"It is _very_ weird."

"I bet it is."

Gwen broke in. "Are you going to elaborate and tell us something new or are you just going to dance round it like usual?"

"Dance round it. Care to be my partner?"

"Yep, this is definitely a dream." Ianto heard Owen mutter to himself, as they both watched Jack and Gwen attempt a waltz round the room. And a very poor waltz at that.

"It doesn't matter if you join them then, does it?" Tosh asked, offering him her hand.

"But there's no music!"

Jack tapped the side of his head as he passed them. "It's all in there."

"I can't! I'm not even drunk!"

"Start a new trend." Tosh suggested, as she dragged him away from the desk.

"Mind if I pinch Jack?" Ianto asked Gwen courteously.

"Be my guest. He keeps treading on my feet."

"Only because you keep putting them in the wrong places, Miss Cooper."

"I'll go watch then, shall I?"

"There's always Janet."

"No thanks. I don't think much of her favourite move."

"What, the one where she tries to rip your throat out?"

"Yeah, that's the one." Gwen disengaged herself from Jack and turned to Ianto. "He's all yours. And I hope you're wearing steel-capped boots."

"You need to take lessons, Owen!" Jack called over as he swapped Gwen for Ianto.

"Yeah, well 'ballroom dancing to imaginary music' isn't really my style."

"Ballet?" Tosh inquired, and laughed when he glared at her.

Gwen leaned back in her chair and smiled as she watched them, wondering just what Jack was whispering in Ianto's ear as he whirled him round.

"So, what would happen next if this was your dream?"

Ianto pretended to think. "Paris would be nice. Or Rome. Knowing my dreams, anything could happen. Suddenly we'd all be getting chased by thirty-eyed, pale blue, spiky aliens with too many teeth."

"At Torchwood, that's quite likely." Jack agreed. "What about if this was reality?"

"Just like normal, I suppose. You'd send the others home and –"

"Jack?"

"I'm not giving him up, Gwen. If you want a dance you can try and prise Tosh and Owen apart."

"No, it's not that." Gwen leaned back away from the computer screen. "It's just that the security cams say there's a horde of blue things eating the brochures up in the tourist office, and they've got far too many eyes for my liking."

Jack looked at Ianto. Ianto looked at Jack.

"Ah."

**I know it… erm… **_**shifted**_** a bit towards the end, but it was quite a depressing last chapter, and I have got the sounds of 'Grease – Summer Nights' drifting in from downstairs. And a little bit of fluff is good for the soul during exam season. **

**Oh, and sorry to any accountants out there if you feel slighted in any way. I apologise on behalf of Jack and Owen, seeing as they will probably never think to do it themselves. **


	20. Don't Panic

**I now have only two exams left! And I have 188 reviews! So thank you thank you thank you to everyone who reviewed the last one: milady dragon, gernumblies, NikkieSheepie, specialfrancine, L.A.H.H., thedeejay, FanGirl Moment xD, Tacroy and Marian Locksley. I'd love to get up to 200 by the next chapter (hint hint). **

**If the title means anything more to you than a vague piece of advice, you will probably be able to follow most of this chapter. If not, then you really need to go and find out where your towel is…**

Don't Panic

"What was all that about?" Jack asked in amusement, as a ruffled-looking Ianto entered his office.

"Owen was giving me his prescription for what he wants me to dream up next."

"Ah. And that is?"

"He wants to be a billionaire with a huge mansion, surrounded with lots of alcohol which doesn't leave you hung-over the next morning and a crowd of pretty girls who shut up when he tells them to."

Jack nodded and let him continue.

"And Gwen said she doesn't care what I dream up for her so long as Owen's as far away from her as possible. Preferably Pluto."

Smiling, Jack leant back in his chair. "We haven't broadened that girl's mind enough yet. I can think of plenty of planets much further away than that which fit Owen's retirement plans far better. So what are they arguing about now?" It wasn't that he could actually _hear _an argument sparking off but he had a feeling that comments like those Ianto had just reported would not be allowed to just drop.

"I don't know." Ianto replied honestly, pushing open the door again.

"…Owen, the entire purpose of your life can _not _just be money and booze! It – "

"And sex."

"- Owen! Look…"

"Did you know," Ianto asked his boss mock-seriously. "That our heating bills have actually gone down since Gwen joined?"

Jack nodded gravely. "But do you think, Mr Jones, as my financial advisor, that all the sick time and funeral expenses incurred from using Gwen and Owen's arguments as out main heat source might outweigh the savings?"

"I suppose so, Sir."

"Right." Jack strode to the door and out into the main Hub, followed by Ianto. He put his hands in his greatcoat pockets, struck a pose in the middle of the floor and announced loudly in his most philosophical voice:

"What is the meaning of_ life_?"

He threw his arms out for the last word, and stood there dramatically with them still outstretched.

As predicted, the squabbling stopped instantly as everyone turned to stare at him: Tosh as though she was wondering what he was going on about, Gwen in concern, Owen as though he urgently needed a mental health check-up, and Ianto with a gaze that suggested a hint of '_he really doesn't know?'_

And then, in various tones of voice, they all said exactly the same thing.

"Forty Two."

It was Jack's turn to stare round in bemusement. "Sorry?"

"You've listened to it too?" Tosh asked, turning round to Gwen.

"Yeah, Rhys has it on tape."

Owen was looking increasingly uncomfortable, as though he'd just said something very embarrassing. Jack, on the other hand, was just looking increasingly frustrated.

"Will someone please explain to me where you've got this from? Why forty two?"

"Six times nine." Ianto explained, grinning mysteriously.

Jack's brain didn't stop to register that Ianto's mental maths was suddenly out. "But where have you _got_ it from?"

"'The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy', of course." Tosh and Gwen chanted in unison, and burst into giggles at the look on Jack's face.

Owen muttered something indiscernible under his breath.

"Don't tell me you've never heard of it!" Gwen said exasperatedly. "I mean, you practically_ are _a galactic hitch-hiker."

"Is this something that fell through the Rift while I wasn't looking?"

"No! It's a radio series!"

"From years back." Owen added.

"So you have listened to it then." Ianto smirked.

"Only because I had nothing else to do. _And_ I was forced."

"Yeah right."

"Look." Jack broke in again. "What has that got to do with the number forty two?"

Tosh took pity on him and explained. "In the series, someone spends years and years devising a supercomputer that's so powerful it can answer almost every question anyone ever asks of it…" Her eyes started to glaze over at that point, and Jack cleared his throat. "Err, yes, well they want to ask it The Ultimate Question – 'What is the meaning of life, the universe and everything?' - so they do and after a long time –"

"Seven and a half million years." Gwen cut in.

"- After a long time it gives them the answer, which is forty two."

"But that doesn't make any sense." Jack protested. "It's not a real answer!"

"But they didn't ask what the actual question was, you see? So they build an even bigger and better computer which is _even more _powerful…"

"And that's the Earth." Ianto finished off, having realised that Tosh wasn't going to. "Only it then gets destroyed just before they get the answer. On a Thursday."

"At lunchtime."

"See, you have heard it, Owen!"

"Yeah, but at least I can't quote it, Tosh."

"I never liked Thursdays." Ianto said softly.

"So they never find out the question?" Jack queried.

"Nope. Not for definite."

"Isn't that just a little bit pointless? How does it end then?"

"Err… They meet the ruler of the universe and his cat and then two of the main characters are abandoned on the tiny planet he lives on when their friend flies off with their infinity-improbability-drive spaceship."

"A what?"

"I wish we had something like that." Gwen said wistfully. "A defence system that could turn incoming missiles into bowls of petunias…"

"That's impossible."

"No, just very improbable." Tosh smiled. "I haven't listened to it in ages, you know that?"

"You couldn't tell." Owen assured her.

Jack tried to get back on track. "And so you actually believe that the meaning of life, the universe and everything is forty-two?"

Gwen shrugged. "Find a better answer."

"But why not forty-one?"

Gwen just shrugged again.

"They had good aliens." Owen declared. "Interesting, I mean. Wouldn't really want to meet one. Like a whatsitcalled… a Hagunennon."

"And the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal." Ianto grinned. "You'll have to bring those tapes in, Gwen."

"Will do!"

"When they said the Earth gets destroyed…" Jack tried to remember what Ianto had said earlier.

"Oh, like I said, the programme's years old. It was supposed to happen decades ago."

"How?"

"It gets dem-"

"Don't say it!"

"Sorry, Gwen?"

"We don't want it to come true!"

"I don't think it works that way." Ianto explained patiently.

"Yeah, I haven't got my harem yet."

"Oh, so it's a harem now is it? You remember that conversation we had about 'equal rights', Owen…"

"Tosh – how does the Earth get destroyed?" For some reason Jack really wanted to know.

"It get's demolished by a Vogon constructor fleet to make way for a hyperspace bypass."

"Why?"

"Because you've got to build bypasses."

"Thanks Gwen."

"My pleasure."

Ianto frowned. "That was another quote, wasn't it? Do you know the whole thing off by heart?"

"Not the _whole_ thing… It was just a game we used to play."

From Owen's expression, Jack is not the only one now down on the 'in urgent need of psychotherapy' list. Ianto watched the doctor sidle off – presumably the conversation had got too weird even for him.

"If I listen to it will you all shut up about it?" Jack whines.

"Feeling left out, sir?"

Jack's tetchy response is drowned out by a sudden PA announcement emerging from the Hub's speakers:

"_People of Earth, your attention please…"_

"OWEN!"

"What, it's not me!" Owen yelled back over the continued blare.

"…_The process will take slightly less than three of your Earth minutes. Thank you very much."_

"Shit." Gwen whispered, eyes wide. "That's not in the script."

**I don't own Hitch-Hikers either. So I have borrowed characters quoting borrowed quotes in a borrowed universe. **

**And that seemed like a good ending, but I really don't know what happens next, and I'm not going to write it. Presumably the Doctor turns up and explains to the Vogons that it's far more economical to build a service station on Mars… The script, for those who want to know, (or at least my extensive memory of it) states that the demolition process takes slightly less than _two_ Earth minutes, not three. Why the technology has got worse I have no idea. **

**And my sincere apologies to those of you who know nothing whatsoever about Hitch-Hikers. I will try and make the next chapter a little more widely appreciable. **

**You know, I'm starting to think that this was a very bad idea...**


	21. Guilty as Charged

**We nearly made it with the 200 reviews. Just two short. But hopefully I'll get them for this one. Please? And thanks to milady dragon, Tacroy, NikkieSheepie, specialfrancine, L.A.H.H., Marian Locksley, Fangirl Moment xD, thedeejay, gernumblies and Sunshine for reviewing! Torchwood and Hitch-Hikers seem to go well together, judging from almost all of your reviews. I still reckon the radio series is better that the books though. **

**This isn't exactly what was requested, but the request sparked off an idea which I thought was a lot more interesting than a simple discussion and which was just too good to pass up…**

**Impending language warning for Owen…**

Guilty as Charged

"He's had me on decaff for a week!" yelled an outraged Owen. "And do you know what he's done now? Your precious little teaboy has moved _all _my instruments, _and _thrown away that pizza I was saving for later!"

"I was tidying up."

"It was deliberate! And you've been putting god-knows-what in my food all week! Don't think I haven't been noticing!"

"And what do you want me to do, Owen?" Jack intervened.

"First of all you can bloody _listen_ to me, and_ then_ you can lock Ianto in a cell with Janet for a week!"

"I demand the right to a fair trial."

"Sorry, Ianto?"

"Trial by jury, sir. It's only fair. I protest my innocence."

"Don't listen to the arrogant little shit! You know he's been doing it! Just –"

"Owen."

"Jack?"

"Shut up. And I like the trial idea. Sounds fun."

Owen scowled as Jack yelled over to Gwen and Tosh, who had been patiently doing their best to ignore the warring trio. "Tosh! Gwen! How do you hold a trial?"

"Do I look like a criminal to you, Jack?"

"I hate to point this out to you, Gwen, but yesterday you _did_ break into one of Cardiff's main banks and threaten the manager with a gun." Ianto told her calmly.

"Yeah, but only 'cos Jack ordered me to."

Tosh took over. "For a trial you need a jury and we haven't got one."

"I'll be the judge and the jury." Jack declared. "What else do we need?"

"Err…" Owen began to protest, feeling sure that this wasn't how it was supposed to work.

"A defence advocate and a prosecutor." Ianto explained. "And an accuser and the accused. That's me and Owen."

"You been in the courts system before?" Owen asked sarcastically. Ianto ignored him.

"Right: Tosh prosecution, Gwen defence."

"Ok." Tosh replied, frowning. "So I'm with Owen, right?"

"Uh huh. Now go and gather evidence and whatever else it is you do." Jack racked his brains to try and remember what the Twenty-first century court system was like. "Speeches, that sort of thing."

"We'll win this easy, Tosh." Owen grinned horribly at Ianto. "You haven't got a chance, mate."

Gwen and Ianto gave him a joint secretive smile and Ianto started whispering something in her ear.

"Well, come on then." Tosh said, grabbing his arm.

"My client Mr Harper – sorry, sorry – My client _Dr _Harper would like to accuse Mr Jones of… Look, Jack, _please _can you take that wig off?"

"That's a wig?" Owen joked. "I thought it was a dead poodle."

Jack looked hurt. "All your judges wear wigs. And carry little hammers. I don't know why, but…"

"The hammer's for hitting people who make disparaging comments about their wigs with." Ianto explained.

"Like Owen did?"

"Yep!"

"He's lying!"

"Jack, it's not for hitting people with!" Gwen interrupted. "And the wig is not necessary! It's just…"

"Distracting." Tosh completed.

"Alright, alright." Jack removed the offending garment. "Now get on with it before this becomes a dictatorship again."

"Alright." Tosh began again. "And just a quick note to say that I don't know much anything about this at all… Ok. My client _Dr _Harper wishes to accuse Mr Jones of various offences against him, including tampering with his food, drink and personal work equipment."

"How do you plead, Mr Jones?" Jack asked, pleased that he knew how this bit went.

"Not guilty, your Honour."

"Err… now what?"

"The prosecution, Jack." Ianto prompted again.

"Alright. Back to you, Tosh."

"Well, me and my client have collected a lot of evidence to prove our case. For a start –" Tosh stood up and walked over to the screen. "We have this video clip from the CCTV footage of the autopsy bay at 7.31 am this morning, showing the accused rearranging the accuser's medical equipment."

The others watched in silence.

"And then we have this CCTV clip… and this one… and this one… to show the accused tampering with the accuser's personal beverages… Would you like to see the other nine CCTV clips, Jack?"

"No, I think that will do. Any more evidence?"

"This half-eaten pizza, covered with a delightful layer of blue mould - oh, sorry, my client says it's a 'specialist topping' - anyway, we found it in the bin. And we have a witness for the offences concerning the coffee and the take-away food."

"Would that witness be Owen, by any chance?"

"Yes."

"Alright, we won't bother hearing him. I'm pretty certain we all know what he's going to say. Defence!"

"Your meant to ask my if I've changed my statement yet, sir."

"Have you changed your statement, Mr Jones?"

"No."

"Well, that was a waste of bloody time, wasn't it?"

"Thank you, Owen. Go on, Gwen."

"My, um, client, Mr Jones wishes to protest against the accuser's, err, accusations. He says that he was merely cleaning up the mess that the accuser is accustomed to leave behind and had no intention of rearranging anything maliciously. He also argues that he can't possibly have disrupted the accuser's filing system for his medical implements because there clearly wasn't one, and wishes to point out that leaving scalpels on the floor and decomposing pizzas in cupboards is a serious health and safety issue."

"Protest." Owen raised his hand.

"Yes, Owen?"

"How do they explain away the food and the coffee?"

"I think Tosh is meant to say that bit." Ianto corrected him.

"So what? It still stands."

Gwen and Ianto looked at each other, and Ianto whispered something hurriedly in Gwen's ear.

"We can't." she said, answering Owen's question, and ignoring his triumphant expression. "And my client wishes to claim guilt, but with diminished responsibility."

"Eh?"

"I wasn't fully responsible."

"Gwen - explain."

"Mr Jones was affected by Dr Harper's recent severe psychological attack on him, which drove him to seek revenge."

"What recent psychological attack?" Tosh demanded, knowing full well what.

"My client refers to the recent incident in which Dr Harper played a subtly-altered audio tape of a particular scene from 'The Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy' over the Hub's announcement system, causing the accused to assume that the Earth was under threat of imminent destruction. Hey, I'm getting good at this, aren't I?"

"Very." Ianto said dryly.

"And I'd also like to call up a witness to show how this episode affected others and drove them to similar actions."

"Who?"

"Toshiko Sato."

"Me?"

"Yeah. Tell them."

"Alright, alright, I helped Ianto. Just a little bit. And Gwen did too. And it was because of the… extermely annoying deception commited by my client."

"Looks like the table have turned on you, Owen!" Jack said cheerfully. "The jury pronounces Ianto guilty but with diminished whatever. So I'm letting him off. As for you, Owen…"

"Hey, that's not fair! You can't just turn on me! You're biased towards them because, because…"

"Because?" Gwen asked, amused.

"Because they're Welsh and they're a minority so you have to be nice to them!"

"Um… what?"

"You know! Like they're more likely to let Black people off otherwise the jury get accused of racism!"

"Owen, I can think of a dozen reasons why Jack would be lenient to Ianto and not to you." Gwen pointed out. "Most have very little to do with the fact that he's Welsh and more to do with the fact that_ you're_ the person in the wrong."

"Can you sentence the accuser?" Jack asked.

"No. Not in the same trial, as far as I know."

"I'm changing the rules then. Owen, I pronounce you guilty of deliberately trying to give us all a nervous-breakdown and faking an alien invasion, and I sentence you to… what was his original suggestion, anyone?"

"I think it was something to do with the cells, wasn't it?" Ianto replied, grinning evilly.

**I hope that went ok. As you may have guessed, I'm a bit hazy with the justice system. I had to ask my parents about it all, and then reassure them that I wasn't in trouble with the police. **

**I'm trying to fit in psychology revision now, particularly how to structure experiment write-ups. So can anyone come up with some psychological experiments Owen could secretly carry out on the others? Please? **


	22. The Joys of Psychology

**This may be a bit overly psychological. I'm sorry if it is. It's also not a standard psychological experiment report – I had to alter it a bit for the purposes of the story, and Owen is **_**not**_ **a psychologist. **

**Thanks to everyone who sent in suggestions: Tacroy, NikkieSheepie, milady dragon, specialfrancine, L.A.H.H., Marian Locksley, thedeejay, gernumblies, FanGirl Moment xD and Meatball42!**

Title: An investigation into stress levels at work

Aim: to investigate subject's (T. Sato) response to stressful stimuli and their effect on her ability to work.

Introduction: Previous observations by the researcher (Dr O. Harper) have found that the subject appears able to work through most types of disturbance (including arguing co-workers) without showing signs of stress. Occasionally there are changes in tone of voice (quieter, calmer and sort of menacing), which are unusual for the subject. Once she shouted at the researcher, but that was because he had just spilt hot coffee down her back, and so the response may be more due to pain.

Hypothesis: The subject will become more stressed and her ability to work will be impaired when exposed to stressful stimuli.

Materials: Computer, iPod

Method: First, the researcher will interrupt the subject at periodic intervals to ask her for help with mundane ICT tasks, all the while observing her reactions. Then he will play loud rock music over the Hub speakers. When he is prevented from doing this by one or more of his annoying team-mates, the researcher will instead resort to walking in and out of the cog door (with slight breaks between each time) in order to set off the alarms. Finally, the researcher will 'accidentally' cause damage to the subject's computer systems. All these things will be carried out covertly, so that the subject does not guess what is happening, and thus ruin the experiment.

Results: The subject showed few signs of stress when frequently questioned by the researcher. By the third time, her replies were growing shorter and more terse. This stage was terminated early (after the fifth time) when a co-worker (I. Jones) presented the researcher with a copy of "Upgrading and Fixing PCs For Dummies".

The second stage caused the subject to increase her concentration on her work - a sure sign of stress. This was most evident when the researcher began singing. This stage was also ended early (as predicted) when a co-worker (J. Harkness) confiscated the researcher's iPod.

Stage three caused the subject obvious distress, but there were no signs of shouting or other violent outbursts. However, after the fourth re-entrance the subject was visibly clenching her fists. The researcher was forced to abandon stage three when a co-worker (G. Cooper) pushed him against a wall and threatened to break his legs if he continued.

Stage four was completed successfully, but when the researcher pretended to apologise for his clumsiness the subject merely smiled at him and calmly replied that everything was fine. She then rebooted the computer (in about 30 seconds) and returned to her work.

Conclusion: The subject takes a long time to become stressed (possibly because she is so absorbed in her work) and when she does so she attempts to hide the signs and concentrate harder on her work. However, the subject eventually seemed to learn to cope with the interruptions, and responded as normal.

Evaluation: Many stages of the study had to be stopped earlier than planned, due to hostility from co-workers. It is also possible that the subject may have guessed the researcher's intentions, causing the unusual results of the last stage.

….

Title: An investigation into OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder)

Aim: To investigate whether or not the subject (I. Jones) suffers from OCD

Introduction: The researcher (Dr ), as a fully trained doctor, has long suspected that the subject suffers from this condition. The subject keeps his appearance immaculate and is very careful to keep the Hub similar state. His organisational structures (particularly in the Archives) are sometimes bizarre, and he often becomes distressed when others attempt to use or restructure them.

Hypothesis: The subject will respond negatively to disorganisation and will attempt to rectify any problems immediately.

Materials: Dirty coffee cups, litter, coffee, brochures…

Method: First, dirty coffee cups and other pieces of litter will be placed in unusual positions around the Hub, and the researcher will observe the subject's response. Then the researcher will 'accidentally' spill a cup of coffee on the floor and again examine the subject's reactions. The researcher will then temporarily seek safety in the tourist office, and, whilst there, subtly reorganise the brochures etc. He will later check to see if these have been put back in their original positions. Finally, the researcher will change the layout of the conference room (by piling all the chairs in a pyramid on top of the table) and see what action is taken.

Results: The subject removed the dirty mugs and litter without seeming to notice that anything was unusual. Timings show that all pieces of litter, dirty mugs etc were removed within ten minutes of positioning, no matter where they were placed. The coffee stain in the floor was likewise swiftly and efficiently removed. CCTV footage shows that all of the brochures in the tourist office had been restacked neatly in their original positions. However, upon discovery of the conference room the subject displayed very strange behaviour, and left it, asking the researcher to check on the cells for him. When the researcher returned, the chairs had been replaced, but all the rubbish etc had been placed on top of his desk, and the equipment trolleys had been moved from the autopsy bay. They were later discovered in a small cupboard several corridors away.

Conclusion: The subject displays many characteristics of OCD, but his deliberate disorganisation towards the end of the experiment suggests that he is also suspicious and paranoid. He was most likely trying to hide the truth of his condition, probably at great internal cost.

Evaluation: It is possible that some of the researcher's actions were not as covert as they should have been, since by the end the subject was clearly aware of the researcher's intentions. Also, chairs do not stack into pyramids well.

…

Title: An investigation into classical conditioning

Aim: To attempt to entrain certain behaviours in the subject (G. Cooper) by pairing certain stimuli with specific responses.

Introduction: The researcher has always been fascinated by Pavlov's research with dogs and has long wondered whether it would be possible to easily train humans in a similar way. If so, it would be of great social benefit to the researcher, as well as very amusing.

Hypothesis: The subject will learn to associate certain objects/actions/whatever with negative responses, and will avoid them in future. (The experimenter thinks this may actually be operant conditioning, but what the hell? He would try the same thing with positive responses as well, only the subject threatened to break his leg this morning, and he wishes to train her not to do this again.)

Materials: Biscuits, weird alien (jam?) substance (see report) and syringe

Method: First, a biscuit was placed on the subject's desk, having been injected with some of that foul-tasting alien jam we found. The researcher waited until the subject had eaten the biscuit, then later offered her another one, observing her response carefully. Later he asked her whether she wanted a blood test doing, saying that she appeared ill and had been acting strangely. On all subsequent occasions when the researcher caught sight of the subject he proceeded to wave a syringe at her. Finally, every time she tried to ask him to stop/ reason with him/scream abuse at him he asked her out (on the basis that the subject appears to find this extremely annoying and confusing).

Results: Having rushed to the bathroom after eating the first biscuit the subject proceeded to throw the second biscuit in the bin, then told the researcher to eat it. Once the researcher began frequently offering blood-tests, having vehemently denied needing one, the subject avoided the researcher at all costs. This was further strengthened by the researcher's offers of a date, after which the subject ignored his presence totally.

Conclusion: It is clear that the subject can be taught certain behaviours, and the researcher hopes strongly that the effects of these will be long-lasting, particularly the last one.

Evaluation: The contents of the alien jam may require further analysis, as they are not as harmless as the researcher was led to believe. He really, really hopes that this study went unnoticed because otherwise his boss is going to make sure he gets nothing but alien jam to eat for a week.

…..

Title: How to take revenge on your annoying bastard of a doctor

Aim: To screw the subject's (O. Harper) brains up and see how he likes it.

Introduction: It is plain knowledge that the subject is a sadistic bastard with a foul sense of humour, as proved by the reports fellow researcher T. Sato found in the Hub network yesterday evening detailing his psychological 'experiments' (see above). The researchers (I. Jones, T. Sato and G. Cooper) guessed what the subject was up to, but still suffered from extreme aggravation, and, in one instance, a bloody awful stomach ache. And so we have decided to get our own back.

Hypothesis: The subject will easily be led to believe that yesterday never happened.

Materials: Lots of fancy tech only Tosh knows the name of, good persuasion skills, yesterday's newspapers and excellent acting skills. And loads of other stuff too.

Method: The researchers kept yesterdays newspapers, changed all the times on all the computers, reconnected the internet so it linked to yesterday's news-sites etc, reprogrammed the date on Owen's phone from a distance using some weird tech and convinced Jack to join in with the general pretence that it was yesterday still.

Results: The subject was very confused and questioned us all closely. Jack then brilliantly took him aside and started questioning about which alien artifacts he'd been near recently. The subject hasn't yet been informed and actually seems to believe that yesterday was just a dream. In fact, I. Jones has just informed me that the subject is giving himself a medical check-up as we speak. He has also informed me that 'subject' is the wrong word and that it should be 'participant', but Owen used it so I'm using it too. Ok, Ianto?

Conclusion: Owen is a bastard and also depressingly gullible. But this is very fun and I can see why so many people become people become psychologists as a careeer. It's like a license to deliberately torture and confuse unsuspecting people. (Jack says that's not actually true, but that's because he wasn't on Owen's list)

Evaluation: Um… we're brilliant and much better than Owen? Anyway, I'm going to stop typing and go and offer him a biscuit.

**What now? I've lost my suggestions list. **


	23. Biscuits, and Other Forms of Torture

**I should be revising right now, but I'm on a creative writing streak after making up most of a fieldwork study for my geography paper. **

**Thanks to all reviewers: gernumblies, FanGirl Moment xD, NikkieSheepie, thedeejay, Marian Locksley, L.A.H.H., milady dragon, ZeMightyPikachu, Grey the Mad Camel and particularly Tacroy, who suggested this… **

Biscuits, and Other Forms of Torture

"Ianto wishes to enquire whether you would still like a biscuit with your hot beverage."

Gwen blinked and looked up from her computer screen. "No thanks, Jack. I'm a bit off biscuits at the moment."

"So you don't want a biscuit?"

"No."

"But you just said you didn't want one."

"I don't want a biscuit."

"You don't not not want a biscuit?"

Gwen thought hard. "Yes. I don't want a biscuit."

"So the answer to the question 'do you not not not want a biscuit?' isn't no?"

"No. Yes!" Gwen glared fiercely at her computer, knowing Jack was grinning in his most infuriating manner.

"So your answer to 'is the answer to the question 'do you not not not want a biscuit?' isn't no?' is no longer no?"

"I'll have a bloody biscuit, ok!"

"I'll tell Ianto."

"Good." Gwen turned back to her computer and made no comment apart from a brisk 'thank you' when the item in question was delivered.

At this point, thanks to intensive training, the average Torchwood employee's time to think up a suitably evil/amusing use for an unwanted biscuit is approximately 0.2 seconds…

"Owen? Would you like a biscuit?"

Owen froze. Gwen's tone was far too pleasant for this not to be a trap. Especially considering recent events. "No thanks," he said carefully, mistrust adding politeness that wasn't usually present.

"You sure? I haven't poisoned it or anything."

"Completely sure, thanks."

"Eat it! It's perfectly safe! What about you, Tosh?"

"I'm on a diet. I think two biscuits exceeds it."

"But pizza doesn't." Ianto remarked. Tosh ignored him.

"Ianto - biscuit?"

"Not now you've waved it in front of everyone's noses. Try Jack."

"Jack…?"

Jack tried to think of a reason that hadn't already been given. "No, because you offered it to Owen first, which makes me suspect that it contains illicit alien substances which are not normally found in biscuits?"

Gwen sighed. "I'll give it to Janet then. Why does nobody trust me?"

Everyone else looked at each other as she left. There was only one answer to that. "Torchwood." Ianto said simply, and Jack nodded sadly.

Owen glanced down at his own uneaten biscuit, suddenly remembering that Ianto wasn't too happy with him at the moment either. Come to think of it, no-one was, really. "Anyone want…?"

"No!"

…..

It was about four hours later, and Jack and Ianto had gone out, when Tosh got a call from Ianto. She put it on speakerphone.

"_Tosh? Have you got any kind of device that picks up… unusual stuff that the rift monitors don't?"_

"No. Not really. Why? Have you found something?"

"_Oh, no, we're fine… hang on, Jack wants to speak to you." _

"_How deep's the lake in Bute Park, Tosh?"_

Tosh read out the figures as Gwen and Owen looked up. "What have you got, Jack?" Gwen asked curiously.

"_Nothing interesting. No water demons or anything." _Jack gave a short laugh, and they heard him say something inaudible to Ianto.

"You ok?" Owen asked, coming over.

"_Look, Owen, we would let you know if we found say, twelve and a half mauled corpses washed up on the west shore of Bute lake. Which we haven't, before you ask." _

"Jack…" Tosh started.

"_Gotta go. Ianto's calling." _And he cut off.

Tosh, Owen and Gwen exchanged concerned glances. "Let's get over there." Owen said authoritatively. 

….

When they arrived, having hastily grabbed the necessary equipment and run all the way up from the Plass (Jack and Ianto having taken the SUV) none of them were particularly pleased to spot Jack and Ianto sitting on a park bench eating ice-creams in the sun.

"Oi!" Owen strode up. "You bastards! You said you were fighting off water demons, not eating bloody ice-cream!"

Jack frowned at his angry face and Gwen's folded arms. "No. I explicitly told you that there weren't any."

"You gave us a body count, Jack!"

"It was all just hypothetical. I'm sorry if we caused you any trouble, Gwen."

Tosh dumped the tool-box she was carrying. "Then why did you want to know about my equipment and how deep the lake was, and everything?"

Ianto smiled. "Jack dropped his wrist-strap in." He gave his boss an amused glance. "But he's got it back now. It was only in the shallows."

Gwen noticed that the bottoms of Jack's trousers were dripping slightly.

"How about I get you all an ice-cream too, to make up for it?" Jack asked, and was met with an enthusiastic response.

"I suppose I'd better go and get them then, hadn't I sir?" Ianto asked, one eyebrow raised. He had had a feeling that Jack's plan would include him doing all the leg-work, even if it was nice to have a team-get-together outside for once.

"That would be great, thanks. No, wait a sec – I'll come too."

Owen watched as they walked off. "How the hell did he drop his wrist-thing in the lake?"

Tosh and Gwen just shrugged. Before Owen had time to come up with a plausible theory Jack and Ianto had returned.

"Careful." Jack said seriously as he handed Owen his ice-cream. "It's poisoned."

"Yeah, right." Owen took a large bite out of the top.

"No, it really is." Ianto warned him. "He put some of that Dodgy Jam in it."

"'Dodgy Jam'?" Gwen queried.

"Jammy Dodgers, Dodgy Jam." Ianto replied, as though this explained everything.

"This is why I can never find anything in the archives." Tosh remarked to no-one in particular. "I take it ours are fine, Jack?"

"Toshiko, I wouldn't dare poison your ice-cream. Same with you, Gwen."

Gwen wiped the ice-cream from her mouth with the back of her hand. "Good."

Owen snorted, and started on the cone.

"Oh God!"

The team watched with a surprising lack of concern as he doubled over. "Feeling alright?" Gwen enquired, with a slight smirk on her face.

"It freaking _kills_!" Owen spat, and Gwen nodded knowledgeably.

"Now _that's_ psychology." said Jack triumphantly.

**And, speaking of psychology, I really ought to go and revise it… One more exam, one more exam… This mantra will help me get through. Ommmm…**

**(Reviews are better, though) **


	24. Crossroads

**Ta to all reviewers: NikkieSheepie, milady dragon, specialfrancine, Tacroy, FanGirl Moment xD, Marian Locksley, gernumblies, L.A.H.H. and thedeejay. **

**This is still being written in a folder entitled 'REVISION' – but my exams are over! Which is a really weird feeling, but not as weird as half-knowing that I'm never going back to school. It hasn't really sunk in yet. So things are ending and things are starting, hence the theme of this (choices & changes – I know it's not particularly philosophical) and the title…**

Crossroads 

One of those days… one of those days where the Earth _moves. _One of those days where you know nothing's ever really going to be the same again, even if it hasn't hit you yet. One of those days where it's hard not to believe it isn't a dream; some game your imagination's playing on you. One of those days where you stop feeling, because you can't believe it's happening to you. One of those days…

One of those days where you have to keep saying 'one of those days' to yourself to try and convince yourself it's true. Because for good or bad, this is _your_ life now, and you've got to live it.

You almost got used to it at Torchwood. Having the ground snatched from beneath your feet was so common it seemed almost pointless bothering to step on it in the first place. But there were still days when you went home and stayed awake all night, trying to work out whether or not something really had happened. Like this one.

Reason doesn't work. Facts don't stay straight. You replay conversations and scenes, wondering what made you do or say what you did. Why it was _those _choices you made in the blink of an eye, without really considering the consequences? Even those ones you planned before hand, those changes you _expected_ to happen – even they still seemed… fictional. Like they'd happened to someone else. Because it just seemed so bizarre that it was actually coming true. And it made you worry, because you know that dreams are more stable than reality. Safer. They didn't make you question who you were and where you fitted in in life. That was the problem with those days.

But like them or not, you had to admit that they made life more interesting.

**Ok. My musings have run out. This isn't surprising, because they just keep going round in circles. So apologies for the shortness. **

**So, has anyone any idea who was actually talking in that? Apart from me? And have you got any decent ideas for a proper chapter? Technically I should be working on another huge fic I'm meant to be writing, but everyone keeps demanding more of this one. (No complaints from my side!) **


	25. On Being Sane in Insane Places

**Thanks to all reviewers: specialfrancine, Marian Locksley, gernumblies, the darkness revealed, FanGirl Moment xD, Grey the Mad Camel, NikkieSheepie and thedeejay. And I'm sorry this took so long. I wanted to write it yesterday, but all the computers were in use. **

**There were some very interesting guesses as to what the last chapter was about, and I'm very glad you liked it (I wasn't too sure) but I still don't know who it refers to. Alright, it quite obviously refers to **_**me**_** for several reasons, but I don't know who it's about in Torchwood terms. So you can continue to believe whatever you like about it. **

**This time the title's from an experiment by Rosenhan, but the theme's a mixture of psychology **_**and**_** philosophy… Just a little inspired craziness on my part, really. **

On Being Sane in Insane Places

Ianto gazed down into his half-empty coffee cup as Owen stood up with his sheaf of papers, so that the doctor would not see his expression. He had a pretty good idea what was coming up.

Owen cleared his throat. "Ok. As you all know, you've each had a psychological health check-up in the last few weeks and I'm meant to give you the results now. Technically I'm supposed to give them to you privately, but I've got to tell Jack anyway and I can't be arsed doing it all twice." Owen shuffled his papers around whilst waiting for complaints. There weren't any. Presumably each individual's nosiness about the others' results was overriding their own fear of potential embarrassment. "Anyway, the general diagnosis for the team as a whole is…"

"…That we're all as mad as March hares?" Tosh suggested.

"I was going to say 'hatters'." Gwen grinned. Tosh giggled.

"Anyway," Owen raised his voice over the sounds of 'Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat', heavily interspersed with giggles, being sung by the two girls, "Although most doctors would have called for the men in white coats by now…" Owen raised his voice yet another few decibels to reach over Ianto joining in with the line 'like a tea-tray in the sky' with a face so serious it was as if he was singing opera, "Contrary to most of the evidence YOU ARE ALL PERFECTLY NORMAL!"

"Eh?" Gwen stopped halfway through the last line, looking mildly shocked.

"…by Torchwood standards." Owen completed, looking smug in the sudden silence.

Jack leaned forwards. "How are you classifying 'sane' here, Owen?"

"I'm working mainly on the principle that none of us have turned into psychopathic murderers yet." Owen looked round at their faces. "At least, I'm fairly sure none of us have. You keep any axes under your bed, Tosh?"

"No." said Tosh, sounding as innocent as possible.

"I've got a chainsaw under mine." said Ianto in a helpful tone, but Owen ignored him.

"Owen, how do I know you haven't misdiagnosed the whole team because you yourself are clinically insane?" Jack asked carefully.

"You don't." Owen replied. "It's great, isn't it?"

"Are you saying that you have to be insane to work here?" Gwen asked.

"Nah. It's insane to work here and stay sane though."

"That's the same thing." Ianto pointed out, in his usual patient tone.

Owen shot him a look full of the alien venom that had burnt through Tosh's laptop case on Tuesday. "I _know_ that, Teaboy. I'm just testing you." Owen turned away from Ianto so he wouldn't see the other man's smirk. "Jack, there is some stuff in here I need to discuss with you though."

As the pair walked off, Tosh wondered aloud. "I wonder what we would have to do for them to class us as insane?"

"You get time off if they do." Ianto remarked. "Recovery time, to get over all the work-related stress."

"Is 'work-related stress' a fancy term for 'getting attacked by monsters all the time'?"

"I should get you writing up the reports, Gwen."

Gwen shuddered. "No thanks. I think I'd rather have some 'recovery time'."

"I quite fancy some time off myself." Tosh mused, a slight smile on her face.

Ianto nodded in agreement seriously. "Operation Asylum begins tomorrow morning."

And they shook hands.

…*…*…*…

"Jack?"

"Yes, Owen?"

"Are you aware that Te… that Ianto is wearing a tea cosy on his head?"

"Yeah. It quite suits him, don't you think?"

"And wellies. On one of the few days so far this month when it hasn't been raining."

"Uh-huh. I made him wear them instead of the flippers."

"Instead of the _what_?"

"Flippers, Owen. I thought he might trip up. It was me who lent him the feather boas though. He seems to like them."

"Yeah. Great." Owen rubbed his nose. "And have you tried speaking to Tosh?"

"Nope."

Owen tailed Jack out of his office and down to Tosh's desk, pointedly ignoring Ianto's odd attire and Gwen's quiet singing.

"Hi, Tosh!"

"Jack, hi!"

Jack turned to Owen. "What's wrong with that?"

"Ask her what she's doing, or something like that."

"Tosh? What are you up to?"

"Working is yesterday installed I programme the if see to database the checking I'm."

Jack raised his eyebrows. "All backwards. Very impressive."

"Easy really it's."

Owen stepped in again. "And Gwen's just sat in front of the computer rocking backwards and forwards and singing songs from old musicals. It's starting to get on my nerves."

"Well, move her somewhere else then."

Owen drew Jack into a corner. "Aren't you worried? I know they're normally a bit… strange, but…"

"Owen, have you read the section of our medical code about what happens when someone is considered too psychologically unsound to continue working here?"

"They get time off to recover, don't they…? Ah! Right! Bastards."

"This is just their response to living in an insane world. Trust me. Now, how about we go and join in the fun?"

"Can't I try to cure them? Please?"

Jack considered Owen carefully, particularly the worrying glint in his eye. On the other hand, Owen's approach could be decidedly… amusing. "Alright. Within reason. Myself, I think tolerance is the best approach."

…*…*…*…

Jack's 'tolerance' approach seemed to involve speaking backwards to Tosh, finding bizarre Torchwood protection gear for Ianto to wear and singing along to the choruses of Gwen's songs. He even helped Ianto with the food – all the pizzas were upside down and carved with smiley-faces and they had to drink the coffee out test-tubes. Jack joined in with gusto.

When he got back from helping Ianto build a house out of the brochures in the tourist office (thank God they were closed today) he found Owen attempting to give Tosh counselling.

"Repeat it after me, yeah? One more time. 'Dr Owen Harper is absolutely amazing'."

'Amazing absolutely is Harper Owen Dr."

"No luck then, Owen?"

"Nah. She won't even do it for chocolate." Owen waved his half-eaten bar in the air.

"Don't I if explode will computer the." Tosh said defiantly, with a hint of worry.

Jack nodded seriously. "Where's Gwen?"

"Wall the to talking started she."

"Isolationist policy." Owen stated happily. "And she was having a negative effect on Tosh."

Jack shut his eyes briefly. "Please tell me it's an empty cell."

"Nah. It's got Gwen in it. Besides, she's perfectly happy down there. She keeps babbling away to someone called Joe."

Jack was actually quite relieved when it was late enough to send them all home without looking as though he was giving in.

…*…*…*…

The next day Ianto walked in wearing a dressing gown and a top hat and Tosh greeted Jack with "It isn't, day lovely a it's?", while Owen looked as though he was looking forward to another day of irritating his co-workers in the name of their sanity. Jack decided just to ignore them all for the day and let them sort it out for themselves. But Gwen… Gwen was freaking him out.

"Gwen? Are you ok?"

"I'm fine, Jack."

"Are you sure?"

Gwen nodded, and carried on typing.

Owen shuffled up to Jack a few minutes later, having confiscated the top hat. "Do you want me to take a proper look at her? She's acting really weird."

Jack frowned. "Have you heard…?"

"Nothing. No singing, no chatting to people who aren't there, no giggling or laughing… she's just been sat there working since she came in. Like… completely normally. Completely. Not Torchwood normal, like she was before; _completely _normal. Which is weird."

Ianto and Tosh wandered over to take a closer look as Owen talked patiently to Gwen. "Is she ok?" Tosh asked. But everyone was too busy listening to the conversation to notice that she'd spoken the right way round.

"Yes, everything's fine with Rhys. Honestly, Owen. Why are you all so worried? You've just given me a check-up – you know I haven't got anything wrong with me mentally."

"You… you're acting weird."

"I'm acting normally, aren't I?"

"Yeah… that's kind of it…" Owen trailed off. He and Jack gave each other a long look, and Jack nodded.

…*…*…*…

"You won't _believe_ this, Rhys!" Gwen seized her surprised boyfriend round the neck, as soon as she rushed through the door. "I've got time off until I'm considered insane enough to go back to work!"

**Here is the rest of Lewis Carroll's rhyme, for those of you who haven't read 'Alice in Wonderland' (which I don't own the copyright to, by the way).**

"**Twinkle twinkle little bat**

**How I wonder what you're at.**

**Up above the world you fly,**

**Like a teatray in the sky**

**Twinkle twinkle little bat **

**How I wonder what you're at." **

**Now you can rock quietly in front of the computer and sing it softly to yourself. I'm doing it now (although I am alone in the house). And if you can't work out what the tune is, well… **


	26. Losing You

**250 reviews! Wow. So tonnes and tonnes of thanks to: FanGirl Moment xD, Tacroy, specialfrancine, Grey the Mad Camel, milady dragon, the darkness revealed, thedeejay, FoxGlade, Marian Locksley, NikkieSheepie and gernumblies! **

**You seemed to like my angsty piece of two chapters ago, so here's another. This time I **_**do **_**know who point of view it's from – This is Ianto's diary, just after the end of season one (quick recap for people like me: it's the bit where Jack's gone). **

Losing You

How am I supposed to write this, Jack? Nothing was ever certain, or defined. None of those 'quaint little categories' you complain about us using. I don't even know what words to use. And I never was any good at saying things, you know that, Jack. So this…

I can't talk to anyone about it. The others don't know. I don't think I could bear them knowing. All Gwen's sympathy and Tosh's quiet concern and Owen's… well, you know what Owen would be like. I can't tell my family. There's no-one. And I don't know what I'd say. I don't think I could even get the words out. I can't even explain it in my head.

It's not the same here without you. We all know that. You were the life of it all, somehow. We're not falling apart but nothing seems to work as well anymore. It's not Torchwood anymore. I'm not blaming the others; they're all trying so hard. But you can tell that they're always wondering. Wondering about you. Why you left us. Weren't we good enough, Jack? I suppose the world's a lot wider for you – you must know so many places and people who are so much more interesting than our dull, fragmented lives in grey and rainy Cardiff. All those stories you tell… Is that where you are? Travelling the universe? Doing all those amazing things and meeting all those amazing people whilst we're stuck back here?

I keep saying your name, like I'm talking to you. Even though you'll probably never…

It's only been a week. Less than a week. I don't know what it was we had, or why… Part of me still can't understand it. I don't know if you saw it as… If you saw it as anything meaningful or not. Or whether I was just another brief affair in a long line of lovers. After so many lifetimes, does it mean anything anymore? You must have seen so many people…

I still can't believe I started it, you know that? That out of us two it was me who asked. That feels wrong too. I can't decide if you just didn't want to push me or if you just seized the opportunity. And I don't want to believe you'd do that, Jack. But Gwen's right: we know nothing about you. I'm calling you 'Jack' and it's not even your real name.

And you left us. And I don't know if you're coming back.

Every time someone calls, every time the letter box rattles, every time the door alarms go off I think, for a brief moment, that it's you.

And I shouldn't be thinking that. Because it wasn't anything, what we had, I know it _wasn't __anything_. It was meaningless. Just a blip in time, a little mistake, something totally separate from real life. I keep telling myself that over and over again.

Then sometimes I read back through some of the stuff I've written over the past few weeks and I wonder if it wasn't just some amazing dream. But I don't want it to be a dream, Jack. Not really. No matter what reason says. I'm fed up with reason.

I'm scared that I've lost you; that I did something wrong.

I'm scared that I'm losing you; that even if you do come back we'll drift apart.

I'm scared that I never had you in the first place.

Sometimes I wish that we'd never started this and sometimes I wish that we started it a lot lot earlier.

Do you know what I wish most, Jack? Apart from all those things I don't dare wish for in case they don't come true? I wish I could sort my feelings out.

But I know that's never going to happen. Not with you.

And maybe that mix of simple and complex, joy and fear and hope and sorrow…

Maybe that's why I just can't get you out of my head.

**Odi et amo; odis an amas… Blame my muse. **

**I think the Latin is wrong. Never mind. **


	27. A Healthy Mind in a Healthy Body

**Mmm, reviews… Reviews are like chocolate cake. For this reason, I have decided to send all my readers some imaginary slices of the chocolate cake/ brownie I baked (It was meant to be a brownie. My brownies always go wrong.) Those wonderful people who reviewed get extra big slices (favouritism, I know). So that's FanGirl Moment xD, NikkieSheepie, milady dragon, specialfrancine, Marian Locksley, thedeejay, Grey the Mad Camel and XbrokenXstarsX. **

**I'm conscious that, well, the philosophical debate side of things seems to have dissipated a little. I suppose the theme of this piece is 'health', or something similar. And thanks to NikkieSheepie for suggesting it. **

A Healthy Mind in a Healthy Body

Ianto's head whirled. What was he supposed to do? Should he wait for Owen? Should he… The door alarms rang, and he rushed across to intercept whoever it was who was entering, before the loud voices could disturb…

"…So we'll go Thursday then." Gwen spotted Ianto. "Hiya! Is that Jack asleep on the sofa?"

"He's ill." Ianto replied quietly.

"Ill?" Tosh queried, as though such a thing was unthinkable. Then she saw Ianto's warning hand movements and lowered her voice. "I thought he would be immune to pretty much everything by now. After all, even if it killed him, his body must learn how to fight it, yes? Is it alien?"

"I don't think so. None of the tests say it is. I think he's just ill. Do you know where Owen is?"

Gwen pulled a face. "He sent me a text telling me _he's_ ill."

Tosh and Ianto exchanged worried glances. Tosh spoke first. "Do you think it's the same thing? Should we bring him in?"

"No." Gwen cut her off. "Judging from the texts I got the night before, the 'ill' should be in inverted commas."

"What a great choice of say to be too hung-over to come into work." Ianto said bitterly.

"He texts you when he's drunk?" Tosh asked curiously.

"Not normally. I think he must have been _very _drunk. I'm not even sure it was me he kept trying to text. Actually, I really hope it wasn't." Gwen closed her eyes briefly.

"You can save them for blackmail purposes though." Ianto pointed out. Right now he would quite like someone to blackmail Owen. What a day to choose!

Gwen considered. "That would involve other people potentially reading what he wrote. And I don't really want that to happen."

Tosh smiled. "So bringing Owen in is out of the question. What are we going to do about Jack?"

Gwen's expression changed to a smirk. "Fancy being doctors for the day?"

From the way Tosh's eyes widened slightly at this Ianto realised that their would-be-victim was in desperate need of protection. "But neither of you know anything more about medicine than I do!"

"What's to go wrong?" Gwen remarked off-handedly. "I mean, what's the worst that can happen?"

"You'll kill him!"

"Exactly." Tosh pointed out. "It's like kill or cure, only in this case it's cure or cure."

Ianto spotted and headed off the next suggestion before it could even be announced. "We are NOT going to kill him just to cure his illness!"

Gwen looked at him affronted. "Like we would do that! Is that him calling you?"

They all paused to listen, and a faint, plaintive "Ianto? Coffee?" could be heard.

"He keeps asking." Ianto admitted. "And I don't know whether I ought to give him some or not. Owen never does, but I don't know if there's an actual medical reason for it or if he just enjoys causing more needless suffering."

"I think the way it works is that we get better faster so that we can have more coffee." Tosh explained. "Or at least that's the way I always see it. Anyhow, it's only fair that he should get the same treatment we do when _we're_ ill."

"Ianto!"

The Welshman in question sighed. "Doctors, would you like me to show you your patient?"

"Are you sure he's not faking just to get sympathy?" Gwen asked as they followed Ianto down.

"I took his temperature and I don't think so. And knowing the way Owen treats us when we're ill I can't see why he'd do it deliberately."

Gwen sighed in a resigned sort of way. "Not man flu then. I know how to deal with that. Hello Jack."

"'lo Gwen."

"That's a sore throat." Tosh said helpfully. "Shall I write this down? And what do you give people for a sore throat?"

Seeing the look on Jack's face, Ianto explained their current situation to him, ending with the decision that they should all have a go at being medical students for the day. Apart from Jack, of course – he got the honour of being their first patient.

"Which means you just get to lie there and get looked after." Gwen said kindly. "Unless there's a Rift alert, of course."

Jack looked rather as though he was going to faint.

* * *

The most common question of the next few hours was "What does Owen do?" The health website Tosh brought up was helpful to some extent, but the drug doses given to Jack were based mostly on guesswork. As were the actual drugs.

To be fair, they did attempt to make up for this slight inconvenience by providing him with large quantities of hot chicken soup and lemsip. They took it in turns to sit and talk to him too, taking advantage whilst he couldn't easily talk back. Ianto even thoughtfully left him a stack of reports to read through, which Jack disdainfully ignored, claiming that reading made his head hurt. This in turn meant that Tosh and Ianto got treated to the sound of Gwen reading the reports out to Jack, amidst croaked protests.

Ianto eventually went and fetched Owen, fed up with the uncertainty of their current nursing strategies. Tosh, Gwen, and specifically Jack were delighted at the arrival of a new patient, the latter because it meant that he would be left alone.

Owen wasn't particularly co-operative in providing help with Jack until Tosh and Ianto had brewed up an evil-smelling 'hang-over cure', at which point he suddenly became much more helpful. Gwen made him drink it anyway.

Between them the trio were able to think up of a _lot_ of hang-over cures, capable of making up for years of prescribed caffeine-deprivation in both number and nastiness. Owen, in his current pitiful state (it really _was_ a bad hang-over), was not really able to argue back, in much the same way Jack was unable to escape his team's ministrations.

There wasn't a Rift alert, of course. That would have been just too good to be true, Jack thought. To be left alone in an empty, peaceful, blissfully silent Hub with no-one to fuss around him unnecessarily or force foul concoctions down his throat. He found himself counting down the hours until they would all go away…

Except they didn't go away. Ianto brought out the camp-beds, determined not to leave until Jack had recovered, and Tosh and Gwen had decided to stay too. Owen was already curled up in a corner, and someone had carefully draped a blanket over him and propped his head up with a pillow in a show of tenderness that belied the rest of the day. Not that they'd bothered to lift him onto a mattress.

And so far from sleeping soundly, Jack spent most of the night listening to the creaking of camp-beds.

* * *

When Jack woke the Hub was still and peaceful. More to the point, his headache had vanished. He tried sitting up, and found he could now manage it without having to lie down again immediately to stop himself from collapsing. A definite improvement. And he felt properly hungry too – he hadn't been able to stomach yesterday's watery chicken soup.

He found Owen already in the kitchen, wolfing down biscuits. After a bit of work they fixed a slightly more filling breakfast for both of them, with toast and acceptable, if not Ianto standard, coffee.

When they returned the others were only just stirring.

"Shit." Gwen moaned, curling up into a ball and cradling her head in her hands. "Feel ill. Really ill. Oh, god, I feel ill."

Tosh croaked something in reply and tried lamely to crawl out of her sleeping bag before giving up. She lay on her camp bed shivering instead.

Ianto looked as though he was about to be sick.

Jack looked at Owen and Owen looked at Jack and both knew_ exactly_ what the other was thinking.

**I finally experimented with fanfiction's line breaks, since I'm fed up of them ignoring mine. Hmmph. **

**More suggestions please! Despite the fact that I should really be concentrating on my friend's birthday fic (now more than a month late. I probably shouldn't have brought that up but I'll send her some imaginary cake/brownie to make up for it.)**


	28. Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder

**The normal but sincerely felt bunch of thanks to: NikkieSheepie, Tacroy, specialfrancine, milady dragon, FanGirl Moment xD, gernumblies, Marian Locksley, thedeejay and L.A.H.H. (x4). **

**Thanks to gernumblies for the prompt which triggered this. She suggested something about whether beauty is physical or psychological, only I haven't really answered the question. But I did write you all some poetry…**

**Hey, it's the holidays! Why should I be all philosophical? **

Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder

Doctor Owen Harper was the happiest he'd been in weeks. No, _months_. Not only did he get to carry out a unique experiment which would benefit Torchwood medical staff for years to come, he was also able to get his revenge on his colleagues in the process.

Owen wanted to see how long Jack took to recover from illness compared to, well, _normal_ people. Like, ones who didn't come back to life when you shot them. This was the best opportunity he was ever going to get to study this – _four _of his colleagues had come down with what the doctor had diagnosed as the same illness. And of course, in order to make it a fair and accurate experiment, he _had_ to treat Tosh, Gwen and Ianto the same way they had treated Jack, didn't he? It wouldn't work otherwise.

Actually, the results of the 'experiment' had already become clear, since Tosh, Gwen and Ianto were now halfway through their third day of quarantine. They were all in quarantine, actually, because the team still weren't entirely 100% sure that the disease was human, rather than alien. And even if it was of terrestrial origin, it didn't seem particularly fair to deliberately spread it round all of Cardiff.

Through the haze of a blinding headache Ianto heard Owen's footsteps approaching the camp bed he was lying on. Later, when the illness had gone and he was able to think straight again, he would be irritated by the unfairness of the fact that Owen never caught it himself, despite all the time he spent around them.

"Come on, Ianto, medicine."

Ianto drank it dutifully, too tired to resist properly and knowing that Owen had force-fed it to Gwen when she refused a few moments ago. He swallowed it as quickly as possible. It tasted foul.

Owen looked down at him in satisfaction. "That should help. Should. How's Tosh? Oh, she's asleep still. Better leave her and give her it later, eh?"

Tosh's eyes blinked open as his footsteps retreated again, looking at Ianto in sympathy. It seemed the medicine had worked a little though, even if his mouth was still bitter from the taste of it. The pain in his head had dulled enough for him to take in the sound of Gwen gagging behind him. He felt slightly sorry for her – Owen blamed her for the concoction _he_ had been forced to drink, not knowing that it had actually been Tosh and Ianto who had brewed it up. They hadn't originally intended to feed it to him. Ianto doubted Gwen would have made Owen drink it if she'd had even the faintest inkling of what had gone into the mixture.

The shuffling footsteps could be heard approaching again, and Tosh immediately resumed the composure of sleep. Ianto and Gwen weren't fast enough.

"I've run out of reports that are boring enough to read out to you." Owen announced. "So I thought I'd try you out with some poetry instead. I wrote it myself."

Ianto couldn't see Owen's face, but he was pretty sure that there was an evil smile plastered over it.

"'An Ode to My Work-Companions' by Dr Owen Harper" Owen cleared his throat and proceeded with his 'poem', ignoring Gwen's quiet moans and Ianto's hoarse pleading.

_"'My work-companions have got a disease._

_It makes them cough and faint and sneeze._

_('Cept they don't sneeze – that was just a rhyme._

_But they do throw up all the time.)_

_Tosh has got spots all over her face_

_Her arms and her neck and all over the place._

_When Gwen speaks she sounds like a frog_

_And Jack doesn't want to snog_

_Ianto, 'cos he looks really ill._

_But their amazin' doctor's given them a pill_

_So soon they'll be better, which'll be a right pain…'"_

"Owen!" Jack strode over. "Stop it _now_."

"I'm displaying my artistic talent!"

"'s bloody awful. Shurrup." a voice, identifiable as Gwen's, whimpered.

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder." Owen quoted defensively.

"Only in this case it isn't." Jack pointed out, indicating the way the apparently sleeping Tosh had burrowed her head as far down under the pillows as she was able.

"Yeah, like this lot would recognise beauty anyway!"

"Well, I do." Jack replied. "Which is why I'd kinda like you to stop."

"Then you don't appreciate beauty either!"

"Ianto's beautiful. Actually, you're _all _beautiful. Can't have favouritism in the workplace."

"Jack, Ianto's all clammy and he looks like he's going to be sick. Gwen is paler than the sheets she's lying on, and Tosh had come out in a rash across most of her upper body. I have to admit that it's an improvement, but…"

"Ok, I so none of them are looking too good at the moment. But I wasn't talking about _that_ sort of beauty."

Owen frowned. "Did you even notice that I just criticised your teaboy?"

"Did you even notice that I complimented you?" Jack paused to watch Owen work it out. "Besides, I was talking about _internal _beauty."

"What, you mean if I cut them up? I shouldn't have to do that. It's just a virus."

Jack ran his fingers through his hair. "Like characteristics. Virtues. Appreciating the beauty of how people really are."

"Oh. That." Owen paused for a second in thought. "I still don't get how you can call them beautiful."

"They're loyal, loving, intelligent, brave, caring, self-sacrificing and a whole host of other stuff. Some occasional breaches, but mostly good, on the whole. Quite modest too – see how Ianto's trying to pretend he's asleep now?"

"Does that stuff apply to me too?"

"Mostly. You might want to remove 'poetic genius' from your list though. You'll have to put up with being a medical genius instead."

"Yeah, well, I hate English. Never could stand it at school. This is the first time I've seen the bloody point to it."

Jack grinned. "We even love the way you can be such a heartless bastard. Deep, deep down. You wouldn't be Owen without it. The others might want you to pick up on the caring side a bit more for now though. Whoops. Gotta go." The sound of a phone ringing was echoing through the Hub. "That'll be Rhys again."

"Again?" said Owen to empty air. "What does he want – hourly updates? Much loved, aren't you?" he addressed Gwen's silent form.

Gwen attempted a glare, trying to hear what was being said.

"Nope… nope… no changes. All still here, yep…. Probably tonight too. Sorry." Jack turned away from the phone and yelled down to Owen. "How's she doing?"

Owen checked briefly. "She's glaring at me."

"…Glaring, apparently. Definitely on the road to recovery then… I'll see if she wants to tell you anything." Jack turned round again. "Gwen?"

"Shurrup. Head hurts."

"No, nothing much. Alright. Bye." Jack clicked the phone off. "He says 'Have fun' and that he's going to go and have a really great time with his mates whilst you lie there being ill."

Owen snorted. "Just goes to show that we're all sadistic bastards."

"… And he also says he's only joking, that'll he'll actually spend a lonely evening at home hoping you'll get better soon and that he'll drop a load of fresh supplies off outside the tourist office tomorrow. Apart from that he just sends general love and get-wells to all, by which I think he means get wells to all the ill people and love to Gwen, unless something's going on behind my back." Jack paused to consider all the wonderful implications this could bring. "Gwen, can you persuade him to swap to emails instead, 'cos these conversations are starting to get a bit repetitive."

"No. Tell 'im I love 'im next time." Gwen tilted her head to look up at them pathetically.

"Will do."

"N' go 'way."

"Cheerful." Owen muttered as they left.

"But she can speak again now. Kind of."

"Yeah, cos that's a good thing, isn't it?"

"Inner beauty, Owen."

"No, talking a lot isn't…"

Tosh, Gwen and Ianto listened to their bickering fade away down the corridor and sighed in joint relief.

**Writing Owen's awful poetry was fun! (And it was _deliberately_ awful, by the way.) What should I do next?**


	29. Love is Reason

**Thank you to all my reviewers! Tacroy, Grey the Mad Camel, milady dragon, thedeejay, gernumblies, deeta, the darkness revealed, L.A.H.H., FanGirl Moment xD, FoxGlade, Marian Locksley and specialfrancine! I would absolutely ****love**** to get up to 300 reviews this time!**

**I nicked the title quote from Tacroy, who suggested this. I will do my best to get round to all the other amazing suggestions too, when I get time. **

Infatuation is a Psychosis - Love is Reason

_Words_

_Words twist and turn like serpents._

_They change meaning like the moon. _

_Triple-tongued and treacherous,_

_Beguiling and bewitching and betraying._

_They never make sense._

_For this reason, I am writing my poem in numbers: _

_7 3 6 7 1 0 4 9 8 2 5 9 2 8 5 6 6 2 8 1 0 4 8 6 7 2 1 0 5 8 9_

_9 8 7 7 7 0 2 4 8 6 0 1 8 5 6 0 2 8 6 9 0 2 2 2 8 1 1 0 9 5 5_

_1 8 6 5 8 9 2 0 6 7 9 6 0 6 7 7 2 8 6 9 7 0 8 7 8 9 2 8 9 6 2_

_2 5 6 6 0 1 1 7 2 9 5 0 7 0 2 8 8 8 6 0 0 5 9 0 1 6 7 2 6 5 9_

_7 6 8 2 1 0 3 5 4 7 9 1 0 5 8 6 9 0 1 9 5 5 2 2 9 4 8 6 9 1 0_

_0 8 5 4 6 7 6 9 7 8 1 9 5 8 7 0 2 3 8 5 9 0 8 2 3 3 9 2 0 5 7_

* * *

_A Haiku_

_I said no to Jack_

_When he said 'write a poem'._

_I did anyway. _

* * *

_Rain_

_Curtains of grey and silver stretching from earth to heaven,_

_Hitting the ground – an endless drumbeat. _

_Eternity wrapped up in that brief moment_

_It takes for one small raindrop to fall. _

_They wash the streets clean of all the day's dirt;_

_Rivers running down the roads, driving the people away _

_Purging the sewers, flooding out the weevils…_

_That's when I get a phone-call – three in the morning _

_Rain pounding off the windows, bouncing off the pavement -_

_And all it says is:'Iaaannntooo?'._

_That's why I hate the rain. _

* * *

Jack looked up from the last poem. "These are pathetic!"

"But they're better than Owen's." Ianto said patiently.

"Yes, but… All you did was complain about the weather and being forced to write poetry!"

"Well, Owen wrote about how awful we look when we're ill." argued Gwen, who had spent far long than she had originally intended to counting out the syllables in her protest-haiku. "Why, what were we _supposed_ to write about?"

"Anger, war, love at first sight… All the stuff you're _meant_ to write about in poems."

"Love at first sight doesn't exist."

"Sorry, Owen?" Gwen looked bewildered by this sudden outburst.

"What about me?"

Ianto rolled his eyes. "Jack, there's a difference between 'love' and 'desire'. And I'm not even sure the last one holds. Infatuation, maybe."

"How does it not exist?" Gwen asked again.

"It's just a natural high, isn't it? Neurochemistry. Not 'love' or anything soppy like that."

"I'm surprised you even think love exists." Tosh said tritely.

"Yeah? Well actually, Tosh, I do."

"So what's the difference between 'real' love and your 'natural high first-sight' love?"

"The real one develops more slowly, doesn't it? It's more… reasoned."

"I thought half the point of love was that it _wasn't _reasonable."

Owen looked over at Tosh. "Yeah, in a sense, but if it takes longer to develop you get to know them better first, right? It's just crazy, otherwise."

"Sometimes that happens quite quickly." Gwen pointed out.

"But not instantly. Not at first glance. 'Cept in the movies, of course."

"But haven't you ever met anyone and _known_ instantly that you were going to be friends?"

"That's not the same thing."

"What about you, Jack?" Ianto asked. "You must have met more people than all of us put together."

Jack frowned. "I kinda think true love grows. Because it's about understanding and friendship and…" He waved his hands in the air a little, as though assuming that they knew what he was on about there. "You don't get that in the first instant you meet someone unless you've got some kind of device or telepathy involved. And I've seen that happen a few times and it's… it's not the same thing. But I think you can meet someone and know almost at once that you're going to get along. Come to think of it, I find that happens to me quite a lot."

"Is that a smug Captain Jack 'I'm so irresistible' comment?"

"Just stating the facts, Owen."

"'Cos I find you pretty resistible."

"Only because I'm not trying."

"Pleeeeaase can we stop this conversation? Now?" Gwen pleaded, Tosh nodding along with her energetically. Ianto wasn't looking particularly happy either.

"You're meant to flirt at work. It lightens the atmosphere or something. Helps you cope with all those daily work stresses."

"Like being chased by weevils?" Ianto enquired seriously.

"I think you'll find the expression is '_chasing_ weevils', Ianto."

"Last time it was 'chased'." Tosh joined in. "Or at least it was for me and Ianto. How did we get on to weevils anyway?"

"Jack was saying that flirtation helps reduce work stress." Gwen recapped for her. "Which it might do for him, but personally I find it quite hard to concentrate when he's exchanging banter with _Owen_, of all people."

"So you'd prefer it if it was you?"

"That's not what I said and you know it."

"But Ianto gets annoyed if I say things in front of you all."

"Sir…"

"… I can't think why, and it's very frustrating…"

"I've told you, sir, it's harassment. You can't single me out in front of everyone else and…"

"Are you accusing me of harassment?"

"Look, just drop it, Jack." Owen butted in. "If you're going to have tiffs with Ianto have them somewhere else. Write them in a poem or something, I don't know."

From the look in Jack's eyes and Ianto's sudden discomfort Owen is regrettably able to predict a spell of decaffeinated coffee shortly coming his way.

He wasn't counting on Jack's sudden new commitment to appearing non-favouritist.

* * *

_Numbers_

_8 4 7 6 9 1 1 2 2 2 8 5 2 8 5 0 7 2 7 6 0 9 2 8 6 7 1 0 2 1 8 1 0 2 3 1_

_6 5 1 8 9 7 8 2 0 9 5 7 7 6 2 9 1 0 0 9 4 8 6 0 2 9 1 1 8 7 5 9 3 2 2 8_

_5 8 9 7 6 8 2 9 6 0 1 2 8 9 6 0 1 8 8 3 6 9 1 0 0 7 8 7 2 7 1 1 1 7 5 7_

_7 1 5 6 79 2 0 0 6 8 0 1 8 3 2 8 5 9 2 0 6 8 3 9 2 5 9 7 9 2 1 8 6 8 1_

_8 4 6 7 1 9 0 4 6 7 9 1 9 9 8 7 9 2 9 1 8 6 9 8 2 9 5 0 0 7 9 2 8 8 9 6_

_1 7 6 9 8 0 0 1 8 7 5 6 1 9 9 7 0 2 0 9 6 8 8 8 9 2 0 6 1 1 0 5 0 1 9 7_

* * *

_Another Haiku_

_Rebellious Gwen_

_Torn between two paths, chose both:_

_Poetic protest._

Hey, are you sure that's the right number of syllables per line for a haiku? I'm not.

* * *

___Doctors_

_Doctors are not supposed to tease_

_Their poor patients when they sneeze._

_In fact I think it's rather mean_

_To mock someone because they're green. _

_A doctor should not show his care_

_By pulling on his charges' hair._

_But he should always treat them well_

_Not make their life a living hell. _

_Dr Harper, however, does none of these,_

_And if he does I won't pay his fees._

_I_ forgive you for your poetic shortcomings. Trying to make up rhymes is actually kind of hard. And as for your suggestion… can you think of anything that rhymes with 'Ianto'?

* * *

_Rain_

_Rivulets running down the window;_

_Golden and silver tears._

_The world beyond all blurred, _

_All the cold and wet and sorrow shut out._

_The heart rests in warm contentment,_

_Debating sleep, waiting for the day to arrive. _

_Listening to the rain and watching you sleep,_

_Never sure whether or not you're pretending, _

_I reach out, move the hair out of your eyes -_

_Half-hoping you'll open them -_

_And all you say is: 'Jack?'_

_That's why I love the rain. _

**So... Which poem do you like the best? **

**I spent ages formatting that on fanfiction, so I really hope it's readable.**


	30. The Problems with Relationships…

**Thanks to all my amazing reviewers – FanGirl Moment xD, deeta, Tacroy, L.A.H.H., the darkness revealed, milady dragon, Grey the Mad Camel, gernumblies, specialfrancine, thedeejay, multicoloured and Marian Locksley! And I was juts one review short of 300. **

**Apologies for how long this has taken. I was partying and doing historical things for the last four days. But it did give me some inspiration for this…**

The Problems with Relationships…

Owen snorted down at the sheaf of papers he was carrying in disbelief. "This girl, right?" He paused for a moment to ensure that he at least had Tosh's partial attention. "She's living with a bloke who's thirty seven! And he already has two kids!"

"So?"

"She's eighteen! He's more than twice her age. Come on Tosh, that shouldn't be allowed."

"Why not?"

"Well… it's just not right, is it?"

"It used to happen all the time. You'd have sixteen year old girls getting married off by their families to wealthy sixty-year-olds."

"And that's right, is it?"

"I thought you'd be all for it." Gwen butted in on her way past. "From the man's point of view, at least."

"Yeah, but when the girl's choosing to do it… That's just weird."

"So what's your legal limit then? How many years between them before it's 'weird'."

Owen shrugged at Tosh's question. "It depends a bit how old they both are. Like at our age four or five years difference is fine, but not for teenagers. So about ten years, roughly?"

"What about time loops?"

"Sorry?"

"I dated a soldier from the First World War. Is that 'wrong'?"

"Will you stop putting little air quotation marks –" Owen mimicked her "round everything I say?"

"Just answer the question."

"It wasn't wrong."

"Thanks, Gwen. If Tosh had wanted _your _opinion she would have asked for it."

"Well _you _obviously weren't going to answer it…"

"Fine! I wasn't happy with it, ok?"

"Next question." Gwen grinned in an attempt to break the sudden awkward silence. "How about when one is, oh, say _six _times older than the other, or something like that?"

"You mean if one's ten and the other's sixty? That's paedophilia."

"She's talking about Jack and Ianto."

"Oh. Well why didn't the stupid bitch say so then?"

"Question. Answer."

Gwen noticed the sudden appearance of a tray of coffee and reached out to Owen in an attempt to stop him before…

"It's a bit weird, yeah, but Jack is kind of frozen at… at whatever age he's at. It'll be bloody weird when Ianto starts looking older than him though and gets white hair or whatever… God, Gwen, will you stop shaking my arm!"

Ianto gave them all a polite wave in the sudden silence.

"Sorry. It's my fault, asking stupid questions, I'm sorry…"

Gwen's hasty apologies were interrupted by a sudden exclamation from Tosh. "Owen! You've had relationships with people through the Rift too! How can you call everyone else's 'weird' when you've done it?"

"I'm so glad I have a normal relationship." Gwen muttered as Owen stormed off, obviously not happy with Tosh's reminders.

"Must be nice having a partner who knows how to turn the washing machine on." Ianto remarked.

"I've got him well-trained. He's better than me, actually, because he's able to fix it. Why, what does Jack do?"

"Jack? He's certainly been more enthusiastic since I pointed out that I do all his washing for him, but he's not always too careful. Why do you think I've got so many pink shirts?"

"I like pink shirts." Jack protested as he strode over, having heard the last part of the conversation. "You look good in them."

"So it's deliberate, is it? Last week you were saying that you liked the red ones best."

"Sort of… I'll get you some more." Jack decided to get back on track hurriedly. "How's the investigation going?"

Tosh turned back to her computer screen. "Well, it's obviously a date rape drug –that was never in question. Owen's still working out the chemical composition, but it's definitely alien. But I've no idea how much there is or how we can get hold of all it. At the moment I'm checking back through all the old Rift patterns to see when and where it could have come through, and cross-referencing it with the CCTV footage from all the different bars and nightclubs."

"So we're no further on?"

Tosh shook her head. "It takes time to check… I'm sorry. And nothing's come up from the CCTV either. Gwen checked."

"And the situation at the hospital's still the same? Nothing's changed with any of the patients."

Ianto nodded apologetically. Jack was looking profoundly unhappy.

"Why would anyone do that anyway?" Gwen asked. "Forget about the harmful alien drugs part – what kind of person would want to do that to someone else?"

"A totally sick bastard." Owen held out a print-out. "That's the chemical scan done. Nothing helpful though."

Reading it through, Jack had to agree.

"I've left the medical systems working out some sort of antidote. It's going to take at least a few hours."

Owen looked tired and worried as well, reminding them all that underneath his prickly exterior he cared as much as any of them, even if he tried to hide it.

This was the worst part. The waiting while they tried to piece it all together, all the time aware that they were working to a deadline. So it's a relief when Tosh's computer programs finally find a match to a large terrace house somewhere on the other side of the city centre.

It's the human ones she always hates, Gwen reflects far later that evening. It's one of the few times Torchwood has been angry enough to follow her original suggestion of 'liasoning with the police' and hand over the charming, well-educated young college student they found in possession of the drugs. Owen had wanted to punch him, so locking the man up was probably for his own safety. But it always made you wonder why you bothered in the first place when you met with cases like these. As well as whom you could trust. If they're not even safe with their own species…

"You ok?" she asked Tosh, who was looking equally exhausted.

"Fine. Fine."

**Ok, I'm rambling all over the place now, so I'd really better stop. I haven't had a proper sleep for the past four nights, so hopefully you'll understand why it might not flow as logically as normal. Plus, I'm emotionally exhausted. **

**Meh. Not happy with this chapter **_**at all**_**. You deserve better. But this is all you're getting for the moment, I'm afraid. **

**I'm not sure if I ought to wrap this soon, because I'm going away shortly and I'm running out of ideas. **


	31. Another Brick in the Wall

**Alright, I promise that this will be better written and more coherent than the last chapter. Thanks to everyone who reviewed anyway despite its obvious shortcomings: specialfrancine, thedeejay, milady dragon, deeta, gernumblies, FanGirl Moment xD, the darkness revealed, Marian Locksley, L.A.H.H. and Grey the Mad Camel. **

**And lots of thanks to Marian Locksley, who suggested this chapter. The theme is 'teacher and learner relationships' so I've done five little(ish) storylets (one for each of them) to make up for the last chapter… **

Best Foot Forward

"Left foot... Right… Right again… Left… and around again…" Jack repeated patiently as they made their way around the room for the fourth time.

"I'm hopeless!" Tosh lamented, as she tripped over her feet yet again. "Let's face it, Jack – I can't dance."

"You won't get anywhere if you keep thinking like that. If you believe you can't then you never will."

"But you make it look so easy!" This was true. Jack was keeping up a stream of muttered instructions whilst steering her gracefully around the floor of the Hub, without once bumping into any of the desks, chairs, old settees, boxes and occasional puddles that were scattered over it, and all without one glance at his feet. Tosh had her gaze permanently fixed on hers, concentrating hard so that she wouldn't tread on Jack's toes.

"Look up. You're meant to look your partner in the eye."

Tosh did so, and watched the glimmer of pain flick across them as she placed her high-heeled shoe just an inch too far to the right. "Sorry! – oh, I'm all muddled again."

"Left is this one."

"Err, thanks."

"You won't be that bad with a bit of practice. See if you can remember the pattern and dance it now."

"Left… right…left- no! Bother!"

"That was very mild."

"It's only dancing. I can live without it."

"Really? I couldn't."

"How did you get so good?"

"Years of practice and some very good teachers. Very good. I'd give you the list, but you wouldn't believe me."

"You're a good teacher. It's just a pity I'm such a useless learner."

"No you're not, Tosh. Dancing just isn't your forte, that's all. Or it might just be ballroom. Have you tried Latin? Or ballet? You've got the figure for ballet, I think."

"Thanks, but no thanks." Tosh smiled warmly at him, trying to imagine Jack doing ballet. Maybe she should have said 'yes' just to see…

"Well done." Jack was smiling too, but not in a mocking way.

"Sorry?"

"You're getting it right now."

"Am I?" Tosh asked incredulously, and promptly lost track of the steps again in her sudden concentration. "Bother!"

* * *

Coffins and Cold Corpses

"Ready for an impromptu lecture on 17th century funerals?"

Ianto looked up at Gwen. "Is this about that ghost procession that keeps repeating itself each Thursday night? How did you work our that it's from then?"

"Well, for a start Jack thinks it is, and knowing him he's probably been to one then. And I did some research on the clothing too. Most of the other stuff doesn't change too much: black coffin, mourners, rosemary…"

"Rosemary?"

"It stands for remembrance, apparently."

"That's in Shakespeare! 'Romeo and Juliet'."

"… If you say so. I think it's actually mostly for the smell though. Did you know they used to keep the coffin in the parlour of the house up until the funeral?"

Ianto raised an eyebrow. "Good thing it's just the images coming through, not the smell."

Gwen wrinkled her nose. "Yeah. Oh, where's the other bit… Poor people used to rent the parish's coffin, then they'd be buried without it and it would get reused."

There was a pause while they both took this in. "Very economical." Ianto commented. "Rent-a-coffin. Can't see it catching on now though. How is any of this helpful?"

"Oh, that was just some of the extras I've found. There was some useful stuff for tracking down exactly when and where it took place… They always got buried at a nearby church, so that should be easy to track down. And from the look of the clothes and the procession the dead person was pretty wealthy, and I'd put the year at around 1660ish."

"Could have been plague. That happened around then."

Gwen shuddered. "That always sounded like a really awful way to die."

Ianto smiled. "And then you get carried to church in a sixth-hand coffin after having been left rotting in your living room for a week or two…"

"I always wanted a tree planted above me when I die." Gwen said thoughtfully. "A birch or something. I don't suppose I'll get that now, what with working in this place."

"No, instead you get frozen and locked up in dusty morgue for all eternity. Cheerful, isn't it? We should tell Jack the trees idea – it'd be nice to have somewhere separate as well. Or we could at least paint our drawers in brighter colours."

"What colour do you want? We could have pictures."

"Oh, I want to have that Spike Milligan quote on it." Gwen looked at him in confusion, so he continued: "_'I told you I was ill'_"

* * *

The Peculiarities of Time

"What're you working on now then?"

Tosh jumped as Owen's voice came from behind her, then tried to pretend that he hadn't caught her by surprise. "I've just finished."

"What?"

"It's an extra defence mechanism. I've adapted the Hub's defence systems so that when they're triggered in an alert it will be able to use Rift energy and that transducer we found – you know the chronoquantum one? – to manipulate the local time dimensions and shut off the whole Hub!"

"Err… what?"

"I can freeze time."

"Sorry, Tosh, this still isn't clicking. How can you _freeze_ time?"

"Well, like I said, the transducer takes the Rift energy and converts it to produce a complex force that acts on…"

"Talk English!"

"Owen, I can't make it any simpler than that and still get the concept across properly!"

"Well you're a useless teacher then."

"Or you're a useless learner."

"Just forget I asked, ok?" Owen paused. "Can I try it out?"

"Try what out?"

"The freezing time thing. Look, we could get Ianto and…"

"No!"

* * *

First Aid

"So what do you do first?" Owen demanded.

"Err… we did it in Police training… see if she's conscious, yeah?"

"Go on then."

Gwen bent over the spot where Tosh was lying on the floor of the autopsy bay and shook her shoulder gently, calling her name. "No, she isn't. Surprise, surprise. We're discounting giggling, right?"

"You've got it wrong already."

"How?"

"You're meant to check that the area's safe first. There could be gas, escaped weevils, loose live wiring… anything."

Tosh opened her eyes in indignation. "Like I'd leave loose live wires lying around!"

"You're unconscious; stop talking!" Owen turned back to Gwen. "So you've done that and checked if she's conscious. Now what?"

"I shout for help?"

"Go on."

"Do I have to? Oh, alright – HELP!"

"Now open her airway –that's her mouth for all you non-medics – and check her breathing…"

"What's up?" Jack was out of breath and clutching a revolver in one hand.

"Ah, sorry, just the first aid training. Gwen was demonstrating the standard call for assistance."

Jack looked put out for a moment, then settled down against the railing to watch as Gwen made a great show of listening for Tosh's breath and holding her hand just above her mouth to feel for it. "I can't hear any breathing because she's giggling so much." she replied seriously, eyes wide.

"Alright. Pretend she isn't doing either. This is the point where you call me or an ambulance or whatever. And while you're waiting you get to do the fun bit."

Gwen and Tosh exchanged glances. Owen's 'fun' bits had never proved 'fun' so far.

"Place your hands on the centre of her chest… yeah, there… and join your hands like _that_ with the heels _there_…"

"Then you do the pushing thing, right?

"Yeah. Thirty times."

"Err… ok. Sorry, Tosh."

Owen and Jack watched in amusement as Gwen dutifully carried out this procedure, while Tosh tried not to giggle.

"Technically you're allowed to break their ribs if it gets them breathing again, but I'd prefer it if you didn't do that now. I've got plans for this evening and they don't involve restructuring Tosh's chest… Have you finished?"

"Yes."

"Right. Rescue breaths now."

"Rescue what?"

"It's the new name for the kiss of life." Ianto announced as he joined Jack in the spectator's gallery. "The only time Owen ever gets to have a romantic involvement with his patients on duty. Most of them die of shock."

"You give her two of them." Owen continued, making no sign of having heard Ianto's comment, although knowing him he had probably jotted it down mentally for later. "Tilt her head back, pinch her nose and breathe into her mouth. It _is_ quite a bit like kissing, really."

"How long for?" Gwen asked nervously, wishing they would all go away and stop watching. Tosh was starting to squirm.

"About thirty seconds normally does it…"

"One second." Ianto interrupted. "The approved time is one second."

Jack smirked down at Owen. "Are you teaching them this merely so you get to watch-"

"No! This is standard procedure, making sure all Torchwood employees know this!"

"Tosh is dead now, by the way." Ianto announced, stopwatch in hand.

"Yeah – get on with it. You can't leave it this long out on the field, Gwen." But in reality Owen seemed to be enjoying Gwen and Tosh's prolonged discomfort.

"Do we have to? I mean, we all know how to…"

"Just do it. Or do you want a first-hand personal demonstration from me first?"

Owen watched the next bit with glee. He had long since discovered that empty threats were useless when teaching these kind of things.

* * *

Colour Blind

"Ok. First you take it all and sort it into piles, see? Blues here, grey and black here, reds over there and whites just beside the basket. So you put all the ones that are the _same colour_ together. Can you do that for me now?"

"I'm not a five-year-old, Ianto."

"…And that one goes there! Well done! Now listen carefully because this is the part you keep having problems with. Only _one_ colour goes in the machine at a time. All the blues together, all the greys together and so on. So if I put this red shirt in which other shirts would I put in?"

"These other two red ones."

"And should I put this white one in?"

"No."

"And what would happen if I did?"

"The red shirts would be fine, the white shirt would turn pink and my favourite Welshman would get annoyed at me again, despite the fact that pink shirts suit him."

"Excellent! Now, would you like to have a go at filling the washing machine yourself? We're doing the whites today – that's that pile over there."

"I'm not colour blind, Ianto."

Ianto nodded vaguely as he watched Jack carefully and somewhat petulantly fill the washing machine. "Have you got that now?"

"Yeah, I think so…" Jack looked proudly down at his handiwork. Then a frown creased his forehead. "Ianto, what about socks?"

As Ianto buried his face in his hands in despair Jack reflected that this was an excellent way of ensuring that he would never have to do the washing again.

**One, two and four are all pretty much from personal experience. For example, I was learning about 17****th**** century funeral practices at the weekend. (It was more fun than it sounds). And I got to paint a coffin. **

**Err… any more suggestions? **


	32. Tidying up Loose Ends

**Sorry this took so long. I'm afraid it's going to be the last for quite a while as well, since I'm away for practically all of the next month. When I pick up fanfiction again (this is likely, as I have several half-finished stories) it shall probably be with a new story, although it is possible that I may add to this one from time to time. **

**Anyway, a late thank you to all those who reviewed (gernumblies, milady dragon, Marian Locksley, L.A.H.H., thedeejay, specialfrancine and FanGirl Moment xD!) and an unspeakably humungous thank you to anyone who has ever read, reviewed, favourited etc this collection of stories! **

Tidying up Loose Ends

_It's not as if I mind, normally. Not when they're all off saving Cardiff or the human race or the world or some other place that hasn't learnt how to look after itself yet. No, it's just when they've nothing to do and have had nothing to do for days. Owen's playing some computer game, for goodness sake! He's a brilliant doctor, yes, but has it ever once occurred to him just once that he could actually bring his empty coffee cup back to the kitchen himself, and save me some legwork? _

_Tosh can be_ quite_ helpful and considerate, until she's absorbed by her computer programs. Then the only 'vacuums' she'll be talking about are the ones she thinks she can manage to create in time if she manipulates the Rift just so… And we all know who'd have to clean _that _up. _

_Gwen _tries…_ Well, she used to try, until she got the message off Owen that cleaning up was my job and she should concern herself with better things. And when she goes into concerned mood it's all 'Can I help, Ianto?' But that's the only time she thinks about it. _

_Jack's the worst. He just sort of expects it, somehow. They all do. They believe their coffee mugs will automatically refill themselves and that the filing will sort itself out if it's left alone long enough. That some sort of magic cleaning dust comes through the Rift each night and polishes each surface until it's gleaming, and even the stains left by Owen's last autopsy just fade away. That all the corpses are mysteriously reanimated and march away and drown themselves in the Bay or set themselves up in murder scenes. _

_I wonder how long they'd last if I left? _

_There's only one way to find out. _

"Where's Ianto?"

Tosh switched her gaze from the computer screen to Jack's face. "I think he's in the tourist office. Why?"

"I… I just haven't seen him around for ages. And there's a file I need to find."

"He's probably found some way of turning himself completely invisible." Gwen joked. "You know, I can't remember seeing him for a few hours either."

"You talking about Teaboy?" Owen shot one last computer-generated monster and swivelled round in his chair. "I haven't had a fresh cup of coffee in _hours. _If he doesn't come down soon…"

"You're going to have to make it yourself?"

"Nah. I don't know how the coffee machine works."

"Don't you just press the buttons…" Gwen flapped her hands around in the air. "I've no idea either."

"He's not in the tourist office." Tosh announced, pulling up the CCTV. "Or the archives."

"I've just checked there." Jack added irritatedly. "I said. Where is he?"

"He could be cleaning the cells out."

A quick scan of the cameras proved that Gwen's suggestion was also wrong.

"Judging from the number of dirty coffee cups lying around and that stain on the table I'd estimate that he's been gone for at least an hour."

"Very helpful, Tosh." Owen was even grumpier now he had realised that there was no chance of a caffeine boost in the immediate future. "Supermarket?"

Jack picked up his phone. "I'll give him a ring."

A minute later, the answer phone proclaimed to the expectant Hub: _"This is Ianto Jones' voicemail. I will be temporarily unavailable for the next few days, but please feel free to leave a message. If it is an emergency, please contact me via the comms. The cleaning equipment is in the large cupboard labelled 'cleaning equipment'. Leave the coffee machine alone."_

"Well." said Owen huffily.

Jack was already on his comms. "Ianto!"

There was a brief pause and then – _"Yes, sir?"_

"Where the hell are you?"

"_On holiday, sir. Is this an emergency?" _

"No, but… He hung up! He hung up on me!"

"Fire him." Owen suggested dispassionately.

"And we'd survive for how long?" Gwen asked him coolly. "Look at you already! Ianto's right. He deserves a break."

"But what are we supposed to do?"

Tosh and Gwen looked at each other in mutual amusement at Owen's obvious helplessness and dismay. "Well, for a start, I'm going to make some coffee." Tosh announced.

"Do you know how to work it?" Owen grabbed at this slender lifeline eagerly.

"I'm sure it can't be too complicated."

"What about this file?" Jack demanded.

Gwen sighed. "I'll help you find it. Owen, you come too. You're not doing anything useful."

Down in the archives a few minutes later Owen's under-the-breath grumbling was interrupted by a shriek of fury from above.

Jack raised his eyebrows. "If I'm hearing rightly, Toshiko has just been defeated by a piece of technology."

"And I'm being defeated by this bloody filing." Owen muttered. "Who the hell files in bloody Welsh? And who the hell files in bloody Welsh when the documents are written in English? Gwen! Come here!"

"Just go get a dictionary!"

"I'm _looking_ for the dictionary! It's not under 'd'!"

"He doesn't have a dictionary. He doesn't need one."

"Well, that's bloody helpful, isn't it? Sounds like _you're_ going to have to be my dictionary instead!"

"It burnt the coffee!" Tosh was striding towards them angrily. "It _burnt _the coffee!"

"What were you using? The toaster?" Owen snapped. "Go run up to Starbucks! And get a bloody Welsh dictionary while you're at it!"

Jack sank down against a wall of filing cabinets, desperately hoping that Ianto's sojourn was not going to be a long one.

Fortunately for them all, it wasn't. Ianto, having patiently watched them all day using his laptop, realised with horror that there was no way the Hub was going to remain standing if he left them to their own devices for another day on their own. More importantly, his precious coffee machine was in danger, and Owen was playing hell with his filing. And no one had cleaned up the trays from the Chinese.

_Ianto Jones, Saviour of all Cardiff. Without my coffee the world would – quite literally - fall apart. _

_And I give in far too easily. _

_Maybe I'll go in now. I won't be able to sleep with those prawn cracker crumbs on the carpet…_

**In case you're wondering, I am currently both bewildered and profoundly irritated by my siblings complete inability to do anything for themselves. Hence Ianto's cleaning angst. **

**See you in September? **


	33. If I Knew My Mind…

**This was in my mind and I had to give you **_**something**_** before I popped off again for another two weeks… This is from Tosh's point of view, and I'm sure you'll work out what it's about soon enough. **

If I Knew My Mind… 

I'm being an idiot. That's all. Me, the supposedly clever one, the sensible one who supposed to be able to _choose_… I should stop, I really should. It's just childish. Completely childish. But somehow I just can't stop, even when I pretend, or try to forget…

I followed him the other day. That's why I'm going on like this. Not at work – no, I just try and treat him normally there. Though I think Jack knows. He knows everything. He probably knows that I followed him that evening. It wasn't hard. I mean, we've got to test all that tracking equipment now and again, haven't we? And it wasn't as if anything interesting happened. He just went into a bar or two, had a couple of drinks, chatted some girl up, went off with her… I'm not sure he even noticed me. If he did he didn't make any show of it. The same way he treats me normally.

I should be used to it by now. I should have got over this by now. All that stuff at work, first Suzie and then Gwen and that Diane, trying not to feel just that _little_ bit jealous… he does it all the time. With everyone. Everyone but me.

Why not? Is there something wrong with me? Am I just too much of a geek, or not pretty enough or confident enough? I've brought it into conversations with the others now and again, and well, Jack says he doesn't know many people who are brave enough to do what I do everyday, and that we're all 'geeks' down here, if that's the term I want to use for it. Ianto says I'm fine just as I am and Gwen… Gwen once said that I'm one of the prettiest women she's ever met and that she wishes she looked more like me. Which is fine to say, but – well, it was you he went for, wasn't it? Not me.

Owen probably thinks I'm too shy and boring and inexperienced. That's probably true. And he's an arrogant, stuck-up prat who doesn't care about or notice those around him… No, that's not true. Well, some of it. He is arrogant and a prat and oblivious to what everyone else thinks… Yeah, it's all true. Let's face it: I should stop being an idiot and find someone better instead of spending all this time trying to pretend I don't care, even when he's having a fling with someone right in front of me…

Even when I make an effort he doesn't notice. I'll sort his work out before anyone else's, fetch him food, put up with all that moaning when everyone else has snapped… But he never notices. Bastard.

That's when I just bury myself in a new computer programme or a transcription for an hour or two and make my own little world. I know I say this a lot, but computers are so much _simpler…_

I wonder what would happen if I told him? But I couldn't tell him. He'd probably think I was joking, for a start, and that Jack had put me up to it. And I'm not even sure myself. It's not worth it, really. But it might… no. Let's just keep on going like this for now. He's probably not right for me anyway, I should probably…

Maybe something will happen, one day.

Maybe.

**Sorry it's short, but it is **_**something.**_** At least, I hope you think so. **


	34. Shots

**Again, I posted the last one so long ago that it doesn't make much sense to thank my reviewers in a huge long list, so I'll just send out a general thanks to all reviewers (that's that bit, by the way). This is just a short thing that popped into my head and doesn't really fit here or anywhere else. I just put it here because I didn't want to post it separately. It's set about mid-series 1. **

Shots

Ianto tried not to glance round at the expectant circle, certain he wouldn't want to see the expressions on Jack and Owen's faces. They already had in mind exactly what they were going to say, and Ianto was certain it wasn't going to be good. Jack was already holding his glass.

It was easy for _him_. There wasn't_ anything_ Jack had never done.

"Come oooonnn Ianto. You're even slower than Tosh."

Tosh and Gwen didn't seem to mind that he was taking a while – both were already clearly regretting having been dragged into this game and were keen to delay Owen's turn for as long as possible. They had both managed to come up with something – something about never going to America or getting married, as far as Ianto could remember – which was better that he could manage. He hated this game. It was so hard to play without saying too much about… well, too much about anything, really.

Owen shifted his seat again in impatience and cleared his throat for another comment. Ianto's gaze alighted on his bandaged arm and seized it as a lifeline.

"I've never been shot."

Owen stopped saying whatever he was about to say and poured drink down his open mouth instead. The others all drank as well.

"We didn't learn much new from that." Tosh commented in a relieved tone of voice.

"We've got to go round and explain, remember." Jack prompted them. This seemed to be Jack's way of making a game of 'never have I ever' even more like torture.

"Fine." Gwen muttered. "When we were up in the Brecon Beacons."

"That Lerxiwhatsit that came through last week." Owen supplied. "As you all know." He turned to Jack boredly.

"Do you want the full list?"

"No thanks."

"_You_ ought to drink the whole bottle." Gwen pointed out.

"At least ten, I should say. Come on, Owen, it's your go."

"Wait a minute." Owen was looking confused. "What about Tosh? I can't remember Tosh ever getting shot."

Everyone apart from Gwen stared at him in astonishment.

"Do you really not remember?" Tosh asked, after a considerable period of time.

"No. When was it?"

"About a year ago." Jack replied. "Before Gwen came." He was still examining Owen carefully.

"Doesn't ring a bell."

Tosh held his gaze for a moment. "Do you remember that time when you were shouting that your hand-gun was broken and you brought it to me because Suzie wasn't there, and you waved it in front of me and said "Look! It won't fire!" "

"No."

"Well that's when I got shot."

**I'll soon be posting a stand-alone short story, but I don't know how regularly I'll be updating, since I'm off to uni next week! **


	35. Knots

**This did come from somewhere, but I'm not sure where now. It would be nice if it were coming from my philosophy lectures, but it quite certainly isn't. It was just something to cheer me up a bit and give me a bit of a break. **

**I would thank reviewers but I haven't much time and I haven't posted for months. I'm sure you all know who you are anyway, and recognise your wonderfulness. This is for you. **

Knots

"Do it again." Tosh ordered.

Ianto did so, as the others watched entranced.

"How do you do it?" Gwen asked.

"You just sort of wriggle around a bit then you just… slip out."

Owen snorted. "I bet he cheated. Him and Jack."

"You try it then."

Jack watched with some amusement as Owen wrapped the piece of string around Ianto's hands as tightly as possible and tied it up with a tangle that put the Gordian Knot to shame.

Ianto wriggled around with it a bit, then…

"How do you do that?"

Ianto shrugged.

"That's amazing, you know that?"

Ianto smiled back at Tosh. "And very helpful too, sometimes."

Jack grinned at both of them. "You should teach them all, Ianto. It'd save some of these awkward hostage situations we keep having."

"Have you lot tie my hands behind my back? I'm not _that_ crazy, Jack."

"Better us than someone else." Ianto pointed out in answer to Gwen's protests.

"It looks really easy anyway." Owen sniffed. "I bet anyone could do it."

"So you're willing to give it a try?"

"No." Owen couldn't think of a defence so he went on the attack instead. "Why doesn't Jack try it?"

"Me? I learnt all that ages ago."

"Off the Great Houdini, I expect."

"Possibly, possibly."

Owen smirked. "I bet Ianto couldn't do that. Not _proper_ escapism."

"If you mean the being-hung-upside-down-in-a-vat-of-water-with-a-straightjacket-on type of escapism, no."

"Do you want me to teach you how?"

"Owen, it's taken me years to find someone who can keep this place as sane as Ianto does, and I don't really want him drowning because he can't work out how to get a straightjacket off in time."

"Spoilsport. Can't we even tie him to a chair or something and see how long it takes him to get free?"

"Deal."

"What?" Owen looked taken-aback by Ianto's sudden agreement.

"It's a deal. Providing that if I do manage to escape I get to do the same thing to you."

Owen weighed up the chances of this happening, and then stuck out his hand.

"Deal."

.

"Are you sure you're ok?" Gwen asked again for what must have been the fifth time in ten minutes. Both she and Tosh were looking on concernedly at the huge quantities of string, cord and duct-tape that Owen was currently attempting to mummify Ianto with.

"No. Can't you find me some decent bloody string?"

"I'm fine." Ianto said calmingly, accurately working out who the query was actually addressed too. He looked as much as ease as if Owen was giving him a massage instead, Tosh thought. Somehow, she really couldn't see that happening. Owen would probably rather be hung upside down in a tub of water instead.

"I'm out of tape!"

"Well, why don't you stop then?" Gwen asked, exasperated.

"Oh, all worried about him now, are you?"

"Look, I'm not going to stop you playing your stupid games if you both want to…"

"Well go away and shut up then." Owen stood up. "There. Shout or something when you want to be untied and I'll come down with a scalpel."

Gwen rolled her eyes at the ceiling. "Or just call through the comms and I'll see if I can get you out _without_ cutting any of your limbs off in the process."

Ianto smiled at them both. "I shouldn't be needing that, thanks."

"Arrogant prat." Owen muttered as they all left.

.

Owen glanced up happily from his autopsy and cheerfully examined the CCTV monitor he'd set up. Yep, Teaboy was still down there, and he looked like he would be for a while yet. Owen returned to his work, already savouring in his mind that moment when Ianto's voice would come over the comms, hesitant, humble and defeated…

"Coffee?"

Owen accidentally sliced through a large portion of the weevil's chest.

.

"How do you rate his chances?" Gwen asked, leaning over Tosh's shoulder.

Tosh smirked. "Pretty low."

"I take it he's still down there then?" Jack commented on his way past. He peered at the monitor along with the rest of them. "Hmm, I see you seem to have used much less string, Ianto."

"There wasn't very much left, sir. But I think you'll find the knots are a lot better."

"Yes. A regular seaman."

"No, I just learned how to tie my shoelaces."

Gwen frowned. "Owen's knots aren't _that _bad, are they?"

"Try them for yourself."

"Jack, Tosh and me are one on this. There is no _way _we are getting tied up in all this, either actually or metaphorically. Just look at Owen."

They all did again. After a while, Jack asked: "How long has he got left?"

"Until he gives up." Ianto replied simply.

"Ah." Jack reconsidered the struggling Owen. "Yes. Well, I hope he makes his mind up before we all go home."

Everyone nodded in agreement. Then there were a handful of overt sideways looks.

Gwen was the first to propose the motion.

"Anyone fancy an early night?"


	36. Why to Learn Dead Languages

**Written because I wanted to write something. And, having written the first three lines off the top of my head, I'm really not sure what's happening with the brackets. Oh, and there isn't actually a plot.**

**Hey, what's new?**

Why to Learn Dead Languages

"You went to see _what_?" (Owen, obviously)

"It's a cultural event." (Ianto, explaining)

"Do we get time off for 'cultural events'?" (Gwen, hopeful)

"Only if it's the recitation of a poem written in… in Ancient Sumerian or something. Not just watching the rugby on telly."

"You could have come too, Owen." (Jack, placatingly)

"What would the point in that be? Why the hell would anyone want to go and sit in a theatre and watch a play performed in a _dead language_?"

Ianto cleared his throat. "I believe the T-shirt quote is 'Classics is not dead: it is immortal.'"

"How do you know what they're saying?"

"Oh, Ianto speaks fluent Ancient Greek, Gwen, and Latin and Ancient Egyptian and … and every other language whose death-throws ended years ago…"

"They have the translation up on screens." Tosh explained over Owen's continued, unintelligible commentary. "And no-one understands ancient languages here, as far as I know."

"And definitely don't listen to Owen," Jack gave him a cheery wink as he spoke "He hasn't even got the hang of English yet."

"What was the play about then? What was it called?"

"Aeschylus' 'Agamemnon'. It's about…"

"Agamemnon?"

"Excellent, Owen. I had no idea your grasp of The Classics was so good. Anyway Agamemnon was the leader of the Greek forces at Troy…"

"…And when he finally gets back his wife murders him. In the bath. See, I know the gruesome bits."

"So it's just about a murder? That's it?"

"What more could you want in a play, Gwen?"

"There's more than one murder." Ianto pointed out. "Agamemnon's already sacrificed his daughter, and there's something about one of his ancestors eating their own children by mistake…"

"And yet we always see the Ancient Greeks as such a civilised nation." Tosh sighed.

Jack grinned. "It gets worse in the next two plays. In the second one the son comes back and kills his mother for killing her husband, and in the third his sister kills him for matricide. At least, I think that's the right order."

"Cheerful." Gwen commented. "Have you watched those too?"

"Yeah, I think so."

Ianto smiled. "A dedicated follower of the Cambridge Greek Play."

"Nah, I was in Athens, I think."

There was a pause.

"What makes me want to ask whether or not this was in modern Athens?" Owen asked carefully.

That just produced another uncomfortable pause.

"Why do I get the feeling that this is another question that's never going to get answered?" Gwen asked hopelessly.

"Because I'm not going to?"

"So, do you actually speak Ancient Greek?" Tosh looked interested at the prospect.

"Not very well. Just a couple of words."

"And apart from your occasional outings to see Greek tragedies what's the point in speaking it?" Owen had reverted to his sarcastic, incredulous tone.

"Well, we had a Roman soldier fall through – why couldn't we get a Greek one? Or any one who doesn't speak modern English, come to that?"

"Are you about to become the dead language minorities officer, Gwen? Campaigning for the right to have an Oxford don translate for them?"

"Well, they deserve to be understood properly, don't they? Just because they're from a different century…"

"We'd need to create a new kind of –ism." Ianto commented, defusing the building Gwen-Owen argument immediately. "Centuryism or something."

"Maybe we could employ some kind of linguist." Tosh mused. "They might be helpful with a lot of the alien languages we come across too. I could finally get that computer manual translated…"

"Tosh?"

"Yes, Ianto?"

"That computer manual we picked up isn't in an alien language. It's in Taiwanese. I checked it."

"Oh? Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"We do need a linguist then." Gwen remarked brightly. "I mean, I don't think any of us are that good at languages… What if we just got someone from France fall through the rift? They might as well be speaking Greek!"

Ianto raised a hand. "Actually, I speak a little French."

"And Welsh." Jack reminded him.

Owen made a scornful noise. "_Welsh _isn't a language, it's just a collection of unpronounceable gibberish."

"Owen, do you speak any language apart from English?"

Owen looked up and met Gwen's firm gaze. "Medical jargon?" he suggested tentatively, then added with a hint of pride: "And most of that's Latin."

"_Most _of it is unpronounceable gibberish." Tosh corrected.

"Well, you can't talk, with all your techo-babble."

"So, going back to our original argument, there _is_ some point in learning dead languages."

Owen thought over Jack's statement for a moment. "Yeah, I suppose. A bit. But you're never going to get a job on it."

"Yes you can."

"Gwen, I am not spending any part of our budget on language experts."

"Come on – six of us? We could get a bit more balance, have another girl. Stop me and Tosh feeling so outnumbered."

Owen scratched his ear. "You know, Gwen, I would fall for that argument, only I can hardly see someone who's spent their whole uni life learning dead languages being particularly good-looking."

"And that's what you look for when you're recruiting, is it?"

Owen did his best to reply nonchalantly, in order to infuriate Gwen even more. "Yep, pretty much. It was Jack who wanted to employ you, by the way."

"Thanks, Owen."

"Have you ever met any classicists, Owen?"

Owen looked up at Jack. "No. Why would I want to?"

"Well, I've known a few and they don't fit your description very well."

"Hmm?"

"Well, there was a lot more partying mentioned, and most of the stuff they were reading seemed to be either erotic poetry or innuendo-laden comedies. Or about murdering people. But either way, quite a bit more interesting than you were making out."

"Sexy subject, huh?"

"Well, anything's better than medicine." Tosh pointed out.

"Yeah, but at least it's a bit more use."

"Oh, I don't know. Some of that sounded a lot more applicable to everyday life."

"Particularly the murdering bits." Ianto added in. "I got some really good ideas from that play we went to."

That threw everyone off course a bit.

"So… you're planning to murder me in the shower?" Jack suggested jokily.

"Of course, sir. And then I thought we could re-enact Caesar, you know?"

Jack nodded happily, spreading his arms in true dramatic fashion.

"Et tu, Ianto?"

**Hence proving that Classics does have a use. And I think 'Ianto' is actually the vocative of 'Ianto'. The dictionary entry would go something like 'Ianto, Iantonis (m) – **_**a **__**Ianto. **_**Ooh, this is exciting! Maybe I'll write the next chapter in Latin! **

**The major problem with this chapter, is of course, that they wanted an Oxford don. I mean – really? **


	37. The Cardiff Latin Course

**Huge thanks, as normal, to my reviewers! Stephy-Lou Clark-Weasley, specialfrancine, TV-a-holic, L.A.H.H., deeta, Grey the Mad Camel, Marian Locksley and NikkieSheepie!**

**I do not own Torchwood. I do not own the Cambridge Latin Course. But I believe that it is perfectly within my rights to rip both of them off. **

**All grammatical errors within this are my own fault. Please feel free to email corrections. (Unless the corrections are for English grammar, in which case I'll feel quite embarrassed. But you can send me them anyway.) **

The Cardiff Latin Course

'_Ianto, -onis_

_Gwena, -ae _

_Toshiko, -onis_

_Owenus, -i_

_Iaccus, -i' _

Ianto peered at the list on the screen. "'_Iaccus_'?" He queried.

"That's me." Jack explained, as though this couldn't be worked out from a simple process of deduction. "They don't have any j's in Latin, and k's aren't common either. I only left one in Tosh's name 'cos it's kind of foreign anyway. And they don't actually have a w either, but I couldn't think of a way to get round that one with Gwen and Owen."

"Great."

"Don't sound so put out. It's easy really. I'm not forcing you to learn it or anything."

"No, you're just showing off."

"Hey! You asked me to write a story in Latin!"

This was true. Ianto was still never entirely sure when Jack was boasting, and he reckoned he knew enough about Latin himself to be able to tell if Jack was just bluffing. "Go on then. What would 'Hub' be? 'Hubbus?'"

"Yeah, probably. Hubbus, hubbus."

"What's the second word you're putting after them all?"

"That's the genitive. 'of' something. Like 'hubbus Iacci' would be…?"

Ianto peered at the screen. "Jack's Hub."

"Uh huh. And 'Ianto Iacci' is…?"

"Jack's Ianto." The possession in question replied, with a hint of distaste.

"See, it's easy really."

"You said you were going to write a story."

"And what would you like the story to be about? You?"

"Not really. Write it about the others and then we can send them it."

Jack grinned and started typing:

'_Ianto, Owenus, Toshiko, Gwena et Iaccus in hubbu sunt. Owenus-'_

"And translate it for me." Ianto interrupted pointedly.

"Aw, come on. Surely you can get that one?"

"We were all in the Hub?" Ianto guessed.

"Well done! Now…"

'_Owenus est in loco medico. puellae sunt in atrio. Ianto est in culina. Iaccus est in tablino scribit.'_

"Owen's in the medical bay, the girls are in the main bit, you're in the kitchen and I'm in my office, writing."

"Is this going to get more interesting?"

Jack frowned in concentration.

'_eheu!' _

"The end?" Ianto suggested.

"No. It means "oh no?" What would you like to happen?"

"Owen can get eaten by a giant snake and I can save him." said Ianto, off the top of his head.

"Ok"

'_ecce! magnus serpens est in loco medico! magnus serpens videt Owenum! serpens non Owenum amat. Owenus habet scalpellum. serpentem scalpello oppugnat.'_

Jack paused to translate: "Look! A big snake is in the medical bay! The big snake sees Owen. The snake doesn't like Owen. Owen has a scalpel. He attacks the snake with the scalpel."

"Did the Romans not have commas either?"

"This is basic Latin, Ianto, not proper Latin. Did you start learning to read using Dickens?"

'_sed serpens est celer et mordet Owenum primus. Owenus clamat et Gwena et Toshiko audiunt. currunt in locum medicum et vident serpentem.'_

"But the snake is quick and bites Owen first. Owen shouts and Gwen and Toshiko hear. They run into the medical bay and see the snake."

"Dramatic."

"Yeah." Jack scratched his head.

'_Toshiko iacit librum serpenti. nunc serpens iratus est. oppugnat Toshikonem et Toshiko fugit.'_

"Tosh throws a book at the snake. Now the snake is angry. It attacks Tosh and she runs away."

"Don't they have guns?"

"There isn't a word in Latin for a gun."

'_Toshiko currit ad tablinum Iacci. dicit "Iacce, magnus serpens est in loco medico! Owenus et Gwena quoque in loco medico cum serpente! Owenus habet vulnum!"'_

"Tosh runs to Jack's office. She says "Jack, there's a huge snake in the medical bay. Owen and Gwen are in the medical bay with the snake too! Owen's wounded!"

"I take it they didn't have a word for 'comms' either."

'_Iaccus currit in locum medicum et oppugnat serpentem. sed serpens mordet illum bis. eheu! Iaccus mortuus est!'_

"Jack runs to the medical bay and attacks the snake. But the snake bites him twice. Oh no! Jack is dead!" Jack glanced up from his typing. "What's so funny, Ianto?"

"Oh, nothing, sir."

'_tum Ianto advenit. Ianto fortus et ingeniosus est. gladium et scutum habet. serpentem oppugnat caute ne serpens mordere illum possit. Euge! serpens mortuus est! ceteri tuti sunt. Toshiko, Owenus et Gwena gaudent! Ianto heros est!'_

"Then Ianto arrives. Ianto is brave and clever. He has a sword and shield. He attacks the snake cautiously so that the snake is not able to bite him. Hurray! The snake is dead! The others are safe. Tosh, Owen and Gwen rejoice. Ianto is a hero!" Jack looked down at his handiwork with pride. "Will that do?"

Ianto smiled, and pressed the 'send' button…

* * *

"Right." said Owen through clenched teeth as Tosh read off the last line of the internet translation. "That's _it._"

"What are you going to do?" Gwen asked, slightly worriedly.

Owen seized the keyboard. "Write one back."

"But you can't…"

"Can't be too hard, can it? All I've got to do is change the words round a bit…"

'_Iaccus smuggus bastard est. Ianto smuggus bastard est. Owenus fortus et ingeniosus est. Ianto non Owenum amet et iacit librum. nunc Owenus iratus est. Owenus oppugnat Iantonem. Ianto habet vulnum et clamat. Iaccus currit in locum medicum et videt Owenum. nunc Iaccus iratus est et oppugnat Owenum. Iaccus scalpellum habet. Owenum gladium et scutum habet. euge! Iaccus mortuus est! ceteri tuti sunt. Toshiko et Gwena gaudent! Owenus heros est!' _

**And if you've been paying attention you should be able to make sense of that… **

**Ooh, that was weirdly fun! **


	38. Self Defence

**Ok, so the translation of the last bit of the last chapter is: 'Jack is a smug bastard. Ianto is a smug bastard. Owen is brave and clever. Ianto doesn't like Owen and throws a book at him. Now Owen is angry. Owen attacks Ianto. Ianto is wounded and shouts. Jack runs into the medical bay and sees Owen. Now Jack is angry and attacks Owen. Jack has a scalpel. Owen has a sword and shield. Hurray! Jack is dead. The others are safe. Toshiko and Gwen rejoice! Owen is a hero!'**

**N.B. 'smuggus bastard' is not Latin. The actual Latin for this is, according to my dictionary, 'sui contentus nothus'. Please don't use this on anyone who doesn't deserve it. **

**N.B. …. Rightly pointed out that Jack is wrong. 'v' normally sounds like our 'w' in Latin (a fact I should know!) so it would be Gvena and Ovenus. My excuse is that I can't write 'Ovenus' without cracking up. **

**This is possible a little, err, violent? I got home to find that the job I'd been promised had been given to someone else and I seem to have taken it out through some character-bashing, which I think only Tosh and Ianto manage to escape… **

Self Defence 

Jack stared at the screen. How come he had never realised this before, never noticed? It was so basic he'd just forgotten about it, let it slip. Seeing it now he understood how goddamn lucky they'd been so far – what had happened today could have happened so many times before, and if he hadn't got there in time… How could he have been so careless? He'd nearly got Owen killed today, and it could have been so easily prevented, if he'd just bothered to…

"Jack? Are you alright?"

Jack looked up into Ianto's face. "Do you realise that Gwen's the only one of you who's ever done any self-defence training?"

"No. Why? Is this about today?"

"Owen could have got out of there easily if I'd ever taught him how too. I could have got him killed. I could have got any of you killed."

"Well, teach us then." Ianto said simply. He couldn't stand it when Jack was this downcast. It was only when a grin started to spread slowly across Jack's face that he realised exactly what he had just suggested.

Jack stood up. "I like that idea, Ianto. I like that idea a lot."

Trailing him miserably out of the office, Ianto reflected that if gun training with Jack had been fun then this was going to be…

* * *

"Right." Jack surveyed his marshalled troops. Ianto was looking slightly rebellious, as though he was having second thoughts. Gwen's arms were folded, and she was watching him curiously. Tosh just looked bleary, as though someone had just dragged her away from a long stint in front of a computer screen. This was probably true. And Owen… well Owen looked just how Owen always looked when Jack gathered them all together for one of his 'announcements'.

"You're all going to learn self-defence."

As always, it didn't go down as well as he'd hoped.

"When?"

"Now."

"But I've got a sore arm." Owen whined.

"The reason you've got a sore arm is because you don't know any self-defence."

Owen just glowered at him. There wasn't really any argument against that one. And he hadn't really enjoyed being pinned to the wall that much either.

"And we're going to learn it all now?" Tosh asked.

"Well, no." Jack admitted. "I'll just cover the basics today, so that you've got some kind of defence if you're unarmed. I thought we'd start off with punching."

Owen brightened up noticeably. Ianto didn't.

"There are pads over there. You can split into pairs." Jack paused a moment to think this through. Owen and Ianto was probably a bad pairing, even if it would be interesting to watch. "Ianto with Gwen and Tosh with Owen."

"Do we have to use pads?"

"Remember that it's going to be you who patches anyone up if you break their arm."

Owen sulkily paired up with Tosh. "I'm going first."

"As you like."

Jack watched them all carefully. "Owen, you're pathetic."

"I've got a sore arm!"

"You've got a sore _left _arm." Tosh pointed out coolly.

Gwen and Ianto stopped for a moment to watch Jack correct Owen's technique. "Try now."

Owen did so. Ianto tried to hide a smirk.

"I'm only being nice to her!" Owen protested. "It wouldn't be fair otherwise!"

Jack and Tosh exchanged looks.

"Try taunting him." Gwen suggested. "Tell him he's too small to punch properly and – that's better, Owen!"

"I'm pretending it's your face."

"Tosh, punch him hard for me when it's your turn, will you?"

Tosh smiled and nodded.

Jack made them swap pretty soon after just to see what she would do. And sure enough…

"Ow!"

"Hey, Tosh, that's some pretty good punching."

"Thank you, Jack."

"Just take it easy on him, will you?"

"She made my arm hurt again."

"Fine. Gwen, go with Tosh and I'll practise with Ianto for a bit."

Jack was amused to find that Gwen put up with Tosh a lot better than Owen had, before he was distracted by a heavy barrage from Ianto.

A few minutes later, when Jack's arms were starting to ache and Ianto seemed to be really starting to enjoy himself he decided to call it quits. "Ok, I think you've all got the hang of that now. Owen, come back over here, will you? It's time we looked at how to get out of holds."

"And everyone turns to look at Owen." Owen muttered miserably as everyone did so. "It wasn't _my_ fault."

"Owen, this is for everyone. You all need to know this. Right, Gwen, come here."

Gwen stayed put. "Why me?"

"You did this in police training. I read through your files today."

"And not at all because you're a girl and you don't punch as hard as Tosh." Owen added snidely, pushing Gwen forward. "Come on, I want to see this."

Even Ianto had to smile slightly as Gwen walked mutinously across and Jack grabbed hold of one of her arms.

"So, just to make sure you remember, how do you deal with this one?"

"I punch you in the face with my other hand, hope you let go, and run."

Jack nodded appreciatively.

"Do you want me to do that?"

"No, I don't think they need that one demonstrating."

Ianto raised a hand. "Sorry, sir, but I don't quite understand…"

Jack grabbed Gwen's other arm before she could seize the opportunity. "Nice try, Ianto. Now, has anyone got any suggestions about what to do if someone's got both your arms, in front of you? Gwen, don't answer this one."

"You kick them?" Owen offered hopefully.

"But then you're unbalanced and you can end up on the floor." Jack pointed out.

"Oh. Are you going to demonstrate that one?"

"Maybe later on. I'll have to cover what you can do if you find yourself on the floor at some point." Jack tried hard not to look at Gwen's face. "Any other ideas?"

"Stamp on their feet." Tosh suggested.

"Could work, but there's an easier one than that. Go on, Gwen."

Relieved, Gwen simply swung her arms round to one side until Jack was forced to let go.

"Ok." said Ianto. "So that's quite easy."

"Exactly! Try it!"

Gwen wasn't sure, but she thought if she had had the chance of choosing between doing this with Owen and with Jack she probably would have chosen Jack. But at least Tosh got to try grabbing hold of Owen's wrists in turn.

"This works with other things as well." Jack said happily, watching them. "Like if someone's strangling you. Come on, Gwen."

Gwen just looked at him.

"I won't hurt you. I'll just put my hands on your throat. Come here."

Reluctantly, Gwen let him.

"Can I try that with Ianto now?" Owen asked, after Gwen had freed herself.

"No, sorry Owen, but I don't trust you quite that much."

"But what do we do if someone's holding our hands behind our back?" Tosh asked. "We can't swing them round then."

Gwen glared at her as she suddenly found herself facing the others instead of Jack. Tosh made an apologetic face back.

"Well, you can try and move both hands up, but I'm pretty sure Gwen won't be strong enough to manage that one…"

Gwen tried and found that he was right.

"So what else do you think you can – Ow!"

"You can elbow them in the ribs, stamp on their foot and run for it?"

"Yes, Ianto you can." Jack replied, in between breaths. "Gwen, come back here."

"Use someone else!"

"No, I'm using you."

"Well, why can't _I _be the one who's grabbing or strangling or whatevering _you_ for once?"

Owen snorted. "Who'd d'you think someone would go for if they came across you both – you or Jack?"

Gwen glared at him, knowing he had a point.

"Anyway," Jack continued. "You're still all probably wondering how Owen could have got out of that situation earlier with the wall…"

"Jack, no!"

Owen snickered at the sight of Gwen warding most of the weight of Jack's body off with her arms, but Tosh was beginning to look uncomfortable. "Jack, you can't…"

"But she knows how to get out. Don't you, Gwen?"

Grimacing, Gwen sharply twisted her crossed arms to one side so that Jack rolled off. He only just caught himself. "Ok, so that was maybe a little too violent as a response…"

"Jack, wouldn't you like her to be quite violent if someone pinned her to the wall like that?" Tosh's voice was nearly as icy as Gwen's now.

"Well, yeah, but not if it was me. That technique also works if you're on the floor, by the way."

"If you dare…"

Rubbing his hand where it had hit the wall Jack decided he wouldn't.

"Tosh will try it, won't you Tosh?"

"No, Owen, I won't. How about you do?"

"Well, I think you all get the idea." Jack added hurriedly, trying to defuse the tension.

Owen raised a hand. "What if you do the same thing whilst holding her hands above her head?"

"I will knee him. Hard." Gwen replied threateningly, already backing off.

Owen sighed dramatically. "There must be some way you can hold her so that she can't reach you."

Gwen suddenly found that her feet were no longer touching the floor and that someone's arm was wrapped tightly around her neck. Dimly, she could here the others shouting.

"Jack, she's choking!"

"Put her down!"

Jack grinned. "Make me." He said simply.

Ianto suddenly realised what Jack was trying to get them to do.

"Excellent, Ianto." Jack croaked happily as he felt someone's hands round his own throat.

"I won't let go until you do."

Gwen collapsed on the floor panting. "You bastard! Why did you-?"

"To get them to realise that they can't just stand around shouting." Jack rubbed his throat with his hands. Ianto had quite a firm grip.

"But they already _know _that!"

"Reinforcement."

Gwen punched him in the leg. Hard.

"Hey! What was that for?"

"Reinforcement."

Owen's eyes lit up with something horriblely, singularly Owen. Unfortunately the rest of the team were in just the right mood to go along with it. "Do you want a little more self-defence reinforcement, Jack?"

* * *

All in all, Jack thought, his best method of self-defence would probably have been not to have taught them so many different ways of attacking him.


	39. Sub Rosa

**Well, I haven't posted here for a while! This chapter was inspired by my essay – yes, you got that right, by my **_**essay**_**. It's about… well, you'll see. **

**Thanks to everyone who read the last chapter, but since I can't even remember what it was about I'm guessing that you can't remember what you wrote either. Thanks anyway. I'm sure it was wonderful. (And the wonderful there referred to your reviews, not to my chapter)**

**Warning: contains Owen-swearing from line one. **

Sub Rosa

"Time travel," Owen announced. "Is shit." He looked around to see if this had had any effect on anyone. It hadn't, so he continued. "Tosh and Jack ended up in the bloody blitz, and where do we end up? Roman Britain, that's where. Only place worse than Wales I can think of."

He glanced across at them, but Gwen was still staring despondently at the wall and Ianto was playing with the dust at his feet. Owen sighed silently to himself. It wasn't often that he was the one trying to raise everyone else's spirits.

"Wish I'd learned Latin now."

Still no response.

"And I bloody miss central heating."

"Owen, stop it!"

"Why? It's better than sitting here in silence!"

Gwen didn't respond, and he realised he'd said the wrong thing. After a while Ianto spoke up, trying to sound cheerful the same way Owen had.

"They never mentioned this in the employee risk analysis."

Owen couldn't risk being sarcastic back. It was probably going to be one of the last times he got the chance to, after all. "What? They didn't consider the possibility of their employees falling through the rifts in time and space into first century Roman Britain and getting sold as slaves there?"

"No. Recompensation policy doesn't cover it."

"Well, that's shit."

"Can't you just both stop it?"

"Just face it, Gwen!" Owen snapped.

"No." She said softly. "I can't. It's horrible." Her eyes wandered around the room, taking in the rest of the men, women and children sat there.

"Slavery's a fact of life, Gwen. We've always had it and we always will do."

"It's sick."

He didn't have much to say in response to that. It was, after all. "At least you two have got more chance than me. Can't see anyone wanting to keep me in their house, can you?" He pointed ruefully at the black eye he'd got when they'd been jumped by the bandits. "Nah, I'll end up in the mines or something. Me, a doctor. God, I wish we could have explained that to 'em. But you two, you should be ok. Nice homes, nice families…"

"Nice owners." Ianto corrected quietly. "Still," he said, with an attempt at a smile. "Torchwood was good preparation."

"They don't even know where we've gone, do they?" Gwen asked. "What's Rhys going to do when he finds out?"

They couldn't answer that one either.

"Look." Said Owen desperately, trying to look them both in the eye. "We'll all be alright, ok. I 'spect it's not that bad really. Just doing lots of boring work no-one else wants to do without getting paid for it. We should get fed and clothed and everything like that. More than we could expect round here." He watched Ianto nod vacantly, thinking _And we'll be insulted and abused and I'm never going to see either of them again…_

Gwen was looking at him with eyes that said the same thing, so he went over and hugged her as tight as he could.

* * *

Ianto had always thought it had been warmer in Roman times, even in Britain, but the weather was wet and murky enough to match his mood. It was cold outside too, cold enough that the tunic-thing he'd been given wasn't keeping it off. He wondered where their original clothes had gone. Well, it'd give the archaeologists something to keep them occupied.

He could see Gwen crying silently out of the corner of his eye and Owen trying not to shiver and failing. Below them some man was pointing at them and shouting, but Ianto had no idea what he was saying. He could give a good guess though.

How would that work out, being stuck with orders they couldn't understand? Ianto was going to have to learn Latin quick. They were going to have to learn everything quick.

Someone in the crowd shouted something out and Ianto squinted down to see who was… well, bidding, was the right word, he supposed, though it tasted foul in his mouth. He knew how worried Owen was about what type of person might buy them – Gwen particularly. He was willing to bet that some of the reasons for buying slaves hadn't changed very much.

Well, one of them seemed to be going for quite a lot of money. That was good, he supposed. And one man at the front of the crowd was getting very excited, jumping up and down in a toga that didn't quite fit and shouting out what Ianto presumed were larger and larger numbers at the top of his voice. Was one of them going to be bought by a madman? He didn't know if that was good or bad. The only other person still competing looked like an even worse alternative though – the sort of thug Ianto was accustomed to see hanging around outside a bar on Friday night in the seedier areas of Cardiff. Was he allowed to cheer someone on?

Suddenly the bidding stopped, and Ianto was suddenly aware that he didn't know who had won. He found himself being shunted off the platform alongside Owen and Gwen, down behind it, away from the crowd. Gwen looked at him desperately and he shrugged – he had no idea what was happening. Then he was pushed forwards again and looked up to see the bouncing man in front of them, now grinning harder than ever and rubbing his hands together exsultantly. He looked like a maniac. This wasn't good. And then another man loomed up behind the first, cloaked and hooded, and said in a voice that was suddenly familiar:

"I hope you realise that all this is coming out of your wages."

**Maybe that was a little dark in some places, but I have been reading articles on slavery all day. Also, there should be a second, slightly more cheerful, instalment coming your way soon to continue this little story… **

**And I really hope you've worked the last few paragraphs out! If you have, review and tell me, and if you haven't, review and I'll tell you. **


	40. Freedom

**As promised, at last! Thank you to special francine, Marian Locksley, thedeejay, L.A.H.H. and Tacroy for reviewing last time. As far as I can tell, only L.A.H.H. worked out who both the unnamed rescuers were, so I've left a fairly huge hint in this chapter as to the identity of the second one. I really did hope more people would get that. **

**This was written with a bit of help from QI, which pointed out in a recent series that owning a slave wasn't illegal in the UK until 2010 (I think I got the wording right there). Going on the principle that most of Torchwood happens before that date, I got this… **

**I don't own QI either. **

Freedom

"I'm afraid the denarius exchange rate isn't particularly good at the moment." Tosh announced from her desk, trying not to grin.

"Oh, I don't care about the exchange rate." Jack called back. "I want that debt paying back in real Roman money, to check I'm not being cheated."

"Or what?" Gwen, asked, hands on hips.

"Well, otherwise I still own you."

Owen gaped at him. "Bloody hell! I thought you'd come there to free us, not to buy us and drag us back here again!"

"I went there to get you back, nothing more. And it wasn't easy, I'm telling you. I should be adding transport costs on, the expense of having to find an agent to help with the sale…"

"Your crazy doctor friend had the time of his life helping us." Ianto pointed out. "And whatever that thing of his is" – Ianto was still rather hazy about all this bit, despite the enthusiastic explanation – "it certainly wasn't running off petrol."

"No, it runs off Rift energy. Alright, I'll let you off the extra costs. But you still owe me if you want to buy your freedom back."

"But you can't keep us as slaves anyway." Gwen pointed out. "It may not be illegal in Roman times, but it's certainly illegal now."

Jack just grinned. "Tosh?" He called.

"It's legal." She told them, looking up from her computer. "You can't buy a slave in the UK, you can't kidnap someone and keep them as a slave in the UK, you can't own slaves in any other part of the British Empire – but there's nothing saying you can't own a slave _here_. Jack bought you in a period when it was legal to buy slaves and he took you here, to a period where it's still legal to own you." She pushed her glasses up her nose. "I'm sorry. I'd contribute to the fund, but I don't think I have any denarii."

Gwen, Owen and Ianto stared at her in disbelief. "You're having us on, right?" Owen croaked.

Tosh shook her head.

"Sooo…" said Ianto slowly. "How much…?"

"Six thousand denarii. Or twenty-four thousand sesterces, if you prefer."

"Right." Said Gwen.

"I think I own a couple of sesterces…" Ianto mused. "A friend gave me them."

"Well, it might pay for Owen."

"_What_?"

"It was a sort of buy-one-get-one-free deal. You were quite a bargain, really."

Owen shook off the insult and concentrated on the positive side of this. "So does that mean I'm already free?"

"How about we divide the cost between us equally, supposing we ever actually come into the possession of six thousand denarii?" Ianto suggested.

Jack grinned again. "It wouldn't be a very wise idea for either you or Owen to do that."

"What do you mean?" Gwen asked suspiciously.

"You cost more than both of them put together." Tosh explained, and watched Ianto choke.

"Considerably more." Jack added.

Gwen's eyes widened.

"Don't consider it a good thing." Owen warned her. "I'm definitely scrapping the equal payments system."

Gwen glared at him, trying to find the words she needed. "But you can't just keep us as slaves!" she burst out. "You're joking, Jack, aren't you – tell me you're joking."

Jack shrugged. "I'm quite happy to keep you all as slaves, if it means that you obey orders a little quicker. You should be glad I'm giving you the opportunity to buy yourselves free."

"And where do you think we might be able to get six thousand denarii from, then?" Ianto asked him.

"Start digging? I can get you in touch with some lovely archaeology students, if you like – they were the ones who found Gwen's phone and your comms. We had to retcon them though, so they probably won't understand your predicament."

"Sorry?" Gwen asked. "You found us because someone dug up my phone?"

"Yeah. At a Roman site, next to a pile of amphorae. Like I said, a lot of retcon."

"There's museums." Tosh added on helpfully. "Some of them have tens of thousands of Roman coins."

"So you're saying we should just break into the British museum, steal as many denarywhatsits as we can get our hands on and – what do these damn things even look like anyway?" Owen demanded.

"I expect they're heavy enough that carrying them out in sacks isn't going to work." Ianto pointed out.

"Yeah, yeah. Look, do you want to be free or not?"

"Don't you think you'd be better off just letting us go?" Gwen pleaded. "Think about how much trouble we'll be."

"Slave revolts." Ianto said darkly. "Just like Spartacus."

Jack tapped his finger on the table in front of him. "Do you know what happened to Spartacus' rebels?"

They all shook their heads, and Ianto hopefully added "They weren't slaves anymore?"

"They crucified them along the road all the way back to Rome, one every couple of miles or so." Jack surveyed them thoughtfully. "There's only three of you, so there wouldn't really be much point doing it along the motorway… Maybe just around the Plass?"

Slightly unsettled, Owen nevertheless grinned back. He was still never entirely sure when Jack was and wasn't being serious, and the last day had been weird enough. "Good one Jack - but I think you'll find that there's only one of you and three of us. And Tosh." He added confidently.

"Yeah, Owen, but we don't come back." Gwen reminded him quietly.

Owen pretended he'd thought of this all along. "Exactly. Why would he want to lose a six thousand denarii investment?"

Jack shrugged. "True. Well, there's always the cells."

"You'd have to feed us."

"Not necessarily."

"No," Ianto continued. "I mean generally. If we're your slaves you have to feed us and clothe us and find us somewhere to live…"

Gwen suddenly saw one glimmer of benefit in all this. "You can pay my flat rent!"

Jack looked at her. "As I said - there's always the cells."

"Hey!" Owen exclaimed suddenly. "I've got an idea! If we go back again…"

"You can steal the money?" Tosh asked. "Owen, I'm not sure-"

"No. If we go back we can sell Gwen-"

"_What!"_

Owen turned to her. "But you're the only one of us who's worth enough to get the money to buy both of us back."

Ianto nodded. "It does make financial sense."

"But you-"

"Toshiko!" Jack broke in on ensuing argument. "I have an offer to make you."

Tosh's eyes narrowed in the sudden silence. "What?"

"I have three slaves here – good quality, only a little argumentative." Jack looked at them appreciatively. "One fine, strong, handsome young Welshman; a trained doctor, quite good-looking, but a little on the small side-"

"Oy!"

"How much are you offering for them?"

"Oh, a tenner for the three of them. I'm feeling generous." Jack winked at her. "But only on condition that you don't sell them on – I'm not having them buying their freedom for a few pounds."

"But-!" Owen started up.

"Two pounds." Tosh stated.

"Two pounds? Oh, come on, that's less than a fifth of what I was offering! This is my best stock! Are you trying to ruin me?"

"Well, _I _think you're charging too much." Tosh counter-argued, beginning to enjoy herself. "I've seen how much they eat – think of the upkeep costs! And they never stop arguing, and as for talking back…"

"Alright, alright, eight pounds fifty, and that's selling them cheap. Look at this one – best coffee in the universe, and I should know."

Owen, Ianto and Gwen watched the bartering go back and forth in bewilderment.

"But you're obviously selling them off for a reason. Are they lazy? Runaways? They look quite disobedient to me. I'll go as far as four pounds, and that's it."

"But you can't sell us." Gwen pointed out. "It's illegal in the UK – you just said."

"Torchwood." Jack explained briefly, before turning back to Tosh. "Seven pounds, and that's my final offer."

"Five pounds."

"How about we settle on six?"

Tosh paused, nodded, and extended her hand. They shook.

Jack nodded in satisfaction. "I'll take the payment now, please."

Tosh fished in her pocket. "I've got… ah."

"Ah?" Ianto queried.

"How much have you got?" Jack asked.

"Four pounds and thirty-two pence."

Jack frowned. "I'll let you take two of them for that, but no more."

The three potentials in question looked at each other. "You are going to free us, right?" Owen asked.

Tosh tilted her hand backwards and forwards in a _maybe_ gesture, smiling slightly.

Gwen stepped forward, eyes begging. "Tosh, I will be your loyal and obedient servant for as long as you like – just _please _don't make me stay with Jack."

"I'm not that bad, am I?" Jack asked, as Tosh nodded her acceptance and Gwen moved to her side happily.

"Pretty bad, Sir." Ianto turned to Tosh to watch her eyes darting between him and Owen.

"What do you want us to do?" Owen asked sarcastically. "Jump up and down going '_Pick me! Pick me_!'?"

Tosh turned to Gwen. "Who do you think I should pick?"

Gwen bit her lip in a pretence of concentration. "I don't know… they're both quite good-looking."

"You're free now, by the way."

Gwen beamed. "Thank you."

Tosh looked between Jack and Owen and Ianto again. "I think I'll take the doctor… Yes, I will."

Owen grinned nastily at Ianto as Tosh handed over her four pounds and she and Jack parted, Jack looking particularly smug. "Looks like you're on the leftover sales rack, teaboy."

Ianto gave him a quiet smile, and wandered off after Jack.

Watching him go, Gwen couldn't help smiling too. "Looks like some negotiation's going on."

"Negotiation? Is that what you call it?"

"I don't think you're really in a position to comment." Gwen tapped her nails on railing in front of her.

"Sorry?"

"Tosh hasn't freed you yet, has she?"

**On the differing prices, I found a fair few sources suggesting that female slaves would often cost more than male slaves. I'm not sure how true it is in general, but it seemed like an interesting one to put in.**

**P.S. I would love to get up to 400 reviews with this. **


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